Close Encounters 2
by chezchuckles
Summary: Follows Close Encounters, a story in which Castle is a CIA spy and encountered Beckett during the episode Close Encounters of the Murderous Kind. In CE2, Castle partners with Beckett to solve her mother's murder.
1. Chapter 1

**Close Encounters 2**

aka** The Man With the Golden. . .**

* * *

**Disclaimer:** This is a work of fiction. Castle belongs to ABC and no infringement is intended.

* * *

He loved her place - the narrow kitchen with its double-paned window blocks sloping up like a greenhouse, the living room's wide embrace of a couch, in her bedroom the pressed flowers and necklaces hanging on the head of an ancient metal rake, the framed photographs scattered through her office bookshelves.

The books. She had a taste for intrigue, he was always pleased to discover, but she'd also read complicated, beautiful things that ranged a gamut of genres - Chekhov and Kierkegaard, Foer and Colette, Dickens and Hornby. He couldn't pinpoint her tastes and he adored the not knowing, the _mystery_ that was Kate Beckett.

With a paper bag from Wang's under one arm and her confiscated apartment key in hand, Castle approached her door with that familiar sense of both urgency and peace.

This was where he belonged.

Though maybe he should put the key away, knock like a gentleman instead of slipping in like a spy.

Castle knocked, leaning one shoulder against the door frame, waiting on her. He heard white noise clicking off, maybe a television or radio, and then the soft padding of her bare feet towards the door.

Okay, that was a guess, but-

Ah, look. He was right.

She was clad in tight, black leggings, a workout top that slicked against her like a second skin, her breasts golden and ripe in the lamp light coming in from her living room. She had her hair back, out of breath, and the sweat formed cool, enticing trails down her neck.

"Castle, about time," she greeted him, reaching out to tug him inside. "I'm starved."

He relinquished the bags, unable to do the same with the spell her body held over his.

"What've you got?" she asked, setting the bag on the counter and turning to face him.

She was so strong - her body taut and lithe like a jungle cat, all dark power and deadly speed. He wanted to lean in and stroke his tongue over the hard line of her bicep, bite the skin where it softened as it met her shoulder. He found himself drawing closer, sliding his hands around her waist and under her shirt so he could press his palms flat to the sweat gathered there.

"Come on, spill it," she huffed, but didn't push him away. "What've you got?"

"Spicy," he murmured, appreciative as he lowered his mouth to her jaw. "Honey." He sucked at the downward trail of salt along her neck, felt her stiffening to reject him and added, "Chicken. Just like you like it."

He pulled his head back to watch her blink through the onslaught to her senses, her body thrumming and ready for his, oh so ready, and then her cheeks flamed as she caught up to him.

"Not _what did you get us for dinner_, Castle. What about my mother's case?" she growled, shoving his shoulders.

Oh. She was ready all right.

She was battle ready.

She was ready to tackle her mother's case with everything in her - body primed and in peak condition for the resulting war against injustice.

Castle pushed his hands in his pocket and studied her, gathering back the shredded remnants of his self-restraint. He nodded slowly. "I found someone who will look at the ME's report, and I'm plotting criminal activity for that month. But I need to see the case file again, Beckett."

She took a half step back from him, but he could see her mustering her defenses through sheer force of will alone. She swallowed hard a few times, making her throat dance, the sweat alluring and maddening.

Castle stepped in, gripped the back of her neck slowly, his thumb angling just before her ear. He could see the sharp intake of her breath as she stared up at him and he was darkly pleased to know he could still make her respond even when she was fighting it.

He leaned in and let his unshaved cheek rasp along her neck before he touched his tongue to the sweat that had pooled in her clavicles, hummed against her skin until she shuddered.

When he pulled back, assent and expectation were in her eyes, a burning and clear lust that made a fist in his spine and burned a path through his senses.

But.

"Dinner first, Kate."

She scowled, but he claimed her mouth again, stroking his tongue inside, stealing her breath.

"Then this," he murmured, canting his hips into hers so she knew exactly what he wanted. "And then we can look at your mother's case."

* * *

Castle ran his fingers over the crime scene photograph one more time, found the sharp edge cutting even though he thought he was being careful.

Beckett was sitting on her hands on the couch, watching him all too closely, and he put the photo away, tucked it back into the front of her mother's case file. But the image burned in his brain.

He knew that handiwork.

The pattern of knife wounds.

He knew that method, that strategy; he'd been taught it himself while in Afghanistan ten years ago. Which meant he had a clear idea of _how_ but-

"Castle?"

He glanced up, saw the raw nerves exposed in her eyes. _Did you find something?_

"Just being thorough. Wanted to check the ME's report again."

She nodded, her bottom lip tugged between her teeth.

He'd say nothing. He couldn't say a word to her until he was certain, one hundred percent, that it was the same group.

A band of hired killers, trained by their own government for black ops, who-

Damn it. This was her mother, murdered in an alley and left for dead. Her mother. How had her mother gotten tangled in something that required cleaning up by a former-Special Forces assassin?

"I made copies," she said intently.

He lifted his head, saw her rocked forward on the couch, nearly trembling.

He'd been right beside Kate Beckett these last three weeks, and he was slowly beginning to see what this case did to her, how her eyes were eclipsed by a darkness he'd never thought possible in a woman filled with such strength and grace. He'd seen her disappear, and even though he continued to haul her off to bed and bring her screaming back, she went away every time.

She went somewhere. . .other. And he was afraid that amazing sex could only stave off that darkness for so long.

She needed help; she needed him.

So he kept it a secret. For now.

* * *

Beckett scraped a hand through her hair, felt it snag on the cuff of her dress shirt. She yanked and strands came out, but the sharp tug brought back her focus.

She was standing in front of a bare murder board, trying to collate the data they'd been given by various witnesses, and simultaneously trying not to think about him.

What he was doing right now.

With her mother's case.

She knew. . .she knew how she could get about this. She'd been holding herself together by a string before he showed up, and then he laid it all out, every secret thing, picked it apart and asked questions she didn't have answers to and-

"Yo, Beckett."

She snapped back to the murder board and Esposito in front of her. "Yeah. Yes. What?"

"Ballistics came back."

It took a great force of effort to haul her concentration back into their murder investigation, to compilate Esposito's ballistics, to compare notes with Ryan, to be present in the reality of the 12th precinct.

But she had to. And she would be a professional, she would give it her full attention because this woman was a victim too, she had been a mother to a daughter, and she deserved justice, she deserved to have a voice.

Just like Beckett's mother deserved as well.

A mother deserved a voice, a chance to speak-

Had Castle ever. . .where was _his_ mother now?

* * *

She had fifteen minutes to kill while she waited on Perlmutter to finish up; Lanie was out today, not sure why, and Perlmutter was always so exacting, so detailed. He hated to be interrupted.

And with time on her hands, and the prospect of her mother's case like a dark, swarming cloud, she purposefully ignored the gnats of questions buzzing in his ears. Instead she called up her web browser on her phone and started sifting through the New York Times archives of Broadway runs and lesser-known productions, hoping to hit on something. What had he told her? She was an actress; she left him at boarding school.

Beckett did some quick mental math, figured he was born in 1969 so that meant his mother left him at school in late 1974 when Castle was five years old, and then she never came back in spring of 1975 when school was out. Kate added 74-75 as a filter to her search and began scrolling through articles, not even sure what she was looking for.

She just knew that she - there had to be balance. The darkness swallowed her if she didn't find debris to cling to, something to keep her head above water.

So she was doing. . .this.

It was a needle in a haystack, but the haystack could keep her afloat.

* * *

Castle found her at her apartment, sunk down on the floor with the case spread around her. She had a carton of leftover Chinese food in one hand, but it looked like she was barely touching it.

She startled when he called her name, lifted her head to see him standing over her.

"How'd you get-" She stopped and grimaced; he held his hand out and she took it, letting him pull her to her feet. "Never mind. What'd you find?"

"Nothing yet. I wanted to see you."

Beckett's lips quirked and she touched his chest with her fingertips, picking at the buttons. "Wanted to see me, huh? See me naked more like."

He grinned wolfishly at her. "That too."

Beckett slid closer, popping his button open and laughing when he sucked in a breath. Castle drew an arm around her waist and dipped his mouth to hers.

She hummed, coming alive for him, and he tugged her shirt out of her pants. "Let's see some nakedness, huh, Beckett?"

"You first, Agent."

He sifted his hands up the bare skin of her back, around to the tensing of her stomach, and waited until her eyes darkened with need, with a desperation that was no longer focused on her mother's case, but on the path of his fingers across her flesh.

* * *

Castle refused to ask his father for help on this one; he manually created a search parameter, breaking out his old computer language code books when he ran up against a brick wall. It was messy and sloppy code, but it was getting the job done.

It'd take a couple of days longer using just his own server for the search and not the office's command center super computers. He wasn't used to that, but he could think of a few other things to follow up on while he waited.

He was officially on sabbatical, and his key card wasn't supposed to have access to the command center, but he slipped in behind Eastman as they were chatting and pulled out a portable keyboard from one row of servers.

Scanning the Department of Defense's inactive rosters was simple enough - finding what he needed in the long list was not.

Castle knew there were a couple of units that received the same black ops training as he'd been exposed to on the Afghan border, but it wasn't like DoD was going to actually label them clearly. He pinpointed a few likely candidates and memorized their designation numbers, then logged off the server.

He nodded to Eastman as he left, went back to his own cramped office where his desktop computer was running the forensic search. For just a moment, he saw his email program, narrowed his eyes at it.

Castle opened the program and groaned at the four hundred and eighteen new messages. He scanned the list and easily deleted the top twenty, paused at the subject line from the North Ireland office.

_Foley_

His finger was clicking it open before he could even think and he read the single line with a heavy heart.

Possible sighting at the airport, most likely headed to the US. Shit.

Castle rubbed his face and leaned back in the chair, letting out a long, controlled breath. Foley was out for blood.

All right. He could-

No.

Gritting his teeth, Castle forwarded it to Eastman. Foley was a ghost; it wasn't enough to pull Castle away from Beckett's mother's murder.

That decided, he popped open a clean laptop and began his file on the elite commandos. He needed to work, get this solved.

What he really wanted to do was drag Beckett out of the station and tie her up in his bed for a couple hours. It was usually the one thing they could both agree on, but he doubted she'd be willing to leave on a Thursday at two in the afternoon.

She wasn't the kind of woman who played hooky.

Too bad.

Oh, but last night, she'd slogged through a thunderstorm and showed up on his doorstep dripping wet, goose bumps erupting on her flesh as she'd stood there. He opened the door wider and she'd jumped him, her wet clothes soaking through his, her mouth hot and fierce even though her skin had been like ice.

She'd been crying, he knew, but he hadn't asked why. He knew that too - the case, the daunting void of having no answers for the last decade. He'd been tempted by the fragile set of her mouth - not to crush it against his own, but to speak. To give over everything, every suspicion, every damning clue.

But he'd cradled her face between his palms instead and pressed love into her eyelids, traced a path of refuge down her nose, brushed her lips with his tenderness. She'd mewled and clawed at his shirt, but he'd subsumed her franticness until she was still but terse beneath him, unhappy with herself for needing him.

He'd driven the resistance from her body with the sharp force of his own, but he knew he'd yet to drive it from her spirit.

Kate Beckett did not want to want him.

He wanted.

* * *

Uh-oh.

Kate tensed and opened her eyes, twisted her head on the pillow to see the man sleeping next to her.

Damn it; she'd done it again.

Castle was deeply asleep, but she knew the moment she twitched, he'd come awake - alert and conscious and aware. So very aware.

She swallowed and closed her eyes, tried to recreate the events of last night. She'd solved a case, gone home, drank some wine. . .

Not too much, not enough, really.

Her mother's case - all the mismatched pieces, all the evidence collected - had laid strewn on her living room floor. No matter what she did, Beckett couldn't make it fit; it didn't make sense. Castle's damn layers - his story. . .there was no story. She'd put the timeline back together, but not even that gave her any idea.

Last week, she'd spiraled down into that bleak hopelessness, had needed to breathe, had needed to escape, and she'd walked out of her apartment in the middle of a thunderstorm and wound up at his door, Castle both breath and refuge.

But this time? Last night? What had done it? What sent her over the edge and toppling into his bed?

Her mother's case and. . .

She had no idea; she'd just come. And now here she was, trapped in his bed when she'd get a call for a body at any moment, plans she'd made for this morning now ruined, promises to herself to not need him broken-

"Mm, Kate."

She opened her eyes and saw the sleepy allure in his, felt his fingers skim her hip and circle her belly button. She hitched in a breath and blinked, curled into him without completely knowing she was doing it.

Castle hummed and lazily explored her back with that hand, his eyes fixated on her mouth as they drew closer.

"Hurry up and kiss me," she demanded, heard the raw tone to her voice.

"Made you scream last night," he smiled, lips brushing hers softly, too softly. "Made you beg."

"I hate you," she moaned, slipped her tongue between his lips, breathed with him.

"I know you do," he murmured. "I hate you too."

And the way he said it, oh help, the way he touched her - she knew it was entirely the opposite.

Before she could panic, his mouth was trailing down, fingers teasing, and she was left breathless and stunned, spread before him.

* * *

Castle laughed, lying on his stomach, and squirmed away from her touch, deeper into the sheets, but Beckett followed, half-draped over his back.

"What's this one?" she murmured, her mouth burning on his shoulder.

"Scar."

"Yes, but how'd you get it?" Her teeth scraped and he grunted, his arm twisting behind him to snag her hip.

"You're relentless."

"Mm, and you're tasty." Her tongue traced the edges and he shivered. He wasn't supposed to say - there were things people should never know, but he loved how she teased, loved the amusement in her voice, loved hearing her come back from that uncertain darkness.

"Plane crash over the Channel," he murmured.

She paused in her exploration, her fingertips brushing over the diagonal scar that bisected his shoulder blade. "Plane crash," she sighed.

Really, anything more was tantamount to betraying-

"Looks deep." It was definitely a question.

"I was - bailing out as it went down."

Her palm pressed to the scar like she was sealing it tight. "Glad you made it. Hitting the water - wicked g-forces there, Castle."

"Mm, true." He sighed and turned over, caught her around the shoulders, his fingers tangling in her hair. "You interrogating me, Beckett?"

"Possibly."

He huffed and lifted his mouth to kiss her but she backed away, fingers stroking his collarbone, a wicked look in her eyes.

He groaned, dropped his head. "What else do you wanna know?"

"You bailed out and-?"

"Well, jeez, that's kinda the climax of the story there, Beckett. See I was in a cargo plane smuggling blood diamonds to a financier in Paris-"

"Bullshit."

He laughed, bringing his hands up to cup her shoulder blades. "You don't believe me? I've got the South Africa sector, but. . .events often take me to Europe."

"Blood diamonds."

"Yes."

"I swear you're lying," she said, narrowing her eyes at him.

Damn, she was good. "All right. No blood diamonds. But I can't tell you what was on that cargo plane."

She must've seen it on his face because she lowered her mouth to his, brushed a kiss over his lips. "Okay. A mysterious cargo. A secret agent. A moonless night over the English channel."

"How do you know there was no moon that night?"

"If you'd been able to see, Castle, you wouldn't have gotten hurt."

He palmed her cheek, thumb stroking over the graceful line of her bone structure. "They put up a fight when I tried to detonate a bomb."

Her eyebrow arched in silent command for him to continue. She was gorgeous - a tensile strength that made him want her all over again.

"On the runway - back in North Ireland - it didn't go off like it should have. I stowed away, worked at getting all the wires back in place, and they found me."

"Oh?"

"Not before I reset the timer," he grinned slowly, curling his fingers in her hair to tug her down close. Her lashes brushed his nose; he could fee her breath move through her lungs. Was she nervous for him?

"How long did you give yourself?"

"Five minutes. Not-"

"-long enough?" she finished. "I should think not."

"I'd just subdued the two - ah-"

"Security guards?" she supplied.

He smirked. In a manner of speaking. "Very good. The two security guards. I'd just escaped with my life-"

"Mm, how dramatic," she murmured, her breath spilling out in a laugh against his cheek.

"I know, right? It's the life of a spy." He grinned against her skin, slipped his hand down her back, squeezing. She arched into him with a gasping laugh, nipped at his bottom lip.

"Keep going, Castle. I wanna hear how this riveting story ends."

"I already told you - I snagged a parachute, ripped open the door, and then the bomb went off. Blew me out, shrapnel caught me as I came down."

"You are a terrible storyteller," she sighed, but her mouth settled over his and her hand drifted down in reward.


	2. Chapter 2

**Close Encounters 2**

* * *

"What are you doing?" he chuckled, felt her hand squeezing his wrist as she dragged him through the stacks.

The New York Public Library was quiet for a Friday afternoon, hushed, and their footsteps were loud against the wooden floor.

"Slow down. Not a race," he laughed, just glad to be with her. He'd been holed up at the 'office' all week, working on her mother's case, looking into medical examiner data from across the boroughs, and when she'd shown up at his place-

Mm, good surprise.

"Here," she said sharply, a little breathless, and pulled him to the periodicals. The journals and magazines were laid out on slanted shelves, their back issues stacked below each one. He spied several boxes of microfiche, but she was bypassing those to show him her laptop.

"What is this?" he asked, his throat choking suddenly as he read the title.

_The New York Times._

Archives.

"I have to be on their wireless to access the database," she explained, tugging him over so he could see the screen.

"What are you doing?" he rasped, rooted to the spot, his eyes caught by the bold, black title: _Broadway Productions, 1970._

"You're poking around in my life, Castle; I thought it was only fair that I do the same."

His heart pounded painfully, his fingers flexed before making fists at his side. "Beckett."

"Oh, it's Beckett now?"

He growled and stepped back, realized his hand was reaching for a weapon that wasn't there. Five weeks into a six-month sabbatical and he still ached for his service weapon. His father would say it was a crutch.

It was.

He scraped a hand down his face. "What have you done?"

"I looked up your mother."

"You don't even have a _name_-"

"I had enough. And I found someone I _think_ is your mother," she amended, raising a hand defensively to him. Castle made an effort to relax his stance, lower his voice.

"You don't know-"

"Read the article, Castle."

"No."

She narrowed her eyes at him, came forward to crowd him back into the bookshelves that closed off this space from the main aisle. "Castle."

"I'm not interested."

She leaned in, her fingers sliding at his waist and hooking over his belt, tugging. He swallowed hard - it really wasn't fair, the way she blatantly used her body to get him to obey her - and tried to close his eyes against her.

"Fine," she gritted out. "I'll summarize it."

"Beckett-"

"It says, _After a long-speculated hiatus, the incredible Martha Rodgers returns to the stage in-_"

He shoved her away, spun out of the alcove, stalking for the stairs, the exit, a way out-

"Richard Castle, do _not_ walk away from me."

His body halted before he could even make up his mind one way or another; traitorous legs, the way they turned him around to face her.

Her eyes were dangerous. "You don't get to ignore your past while you go mucking through mine."

"There's no mystery here, Beckett. No crime to solve. I don't need to know whodunnit," he said, fighting the last five weeks of sloppy mental discipline to regain his edge once more. His father had been right - their kind wasn't meant for this - the sharing, the emotional shit that made everything off-balanced.

"You do," she said firmly. "You need to know, Castle, because deep down-"

Shit, she didn't get to _analyze_ him, not while she was barely hanging on herself, drowning in her mother's case, sucking up every last second of their time together by roughly demanding more - sex or working on the case, sometimes he didn't know.

"-deep down," she continued, stepping closer, stalking him like prey. "You need to know it was worthwhile. Abandoning you. If it was worth it - if her career took off, if she was fulfilled - if she replaced you-"

"Fuck."

"-if she missed out. Because I can tell you, Castle; I can say it all day, all night-" She gave a breathy little sigh and stroked her fingers down his chest, made him tremble with it. "-how very _much_ she's missed out on, not having you in her life, but that's not enough for you. You need the story, you need to know-"

He groaned and claimed her mouth with his, his tongue ruthless and brutal, his teeth scraping hers. He felt her hips jerk hard against his thigh and he clutched her shoulders, slid down her spine to draw her up against him.

A throat cleared somewhere to his right and she yanked back, her breathing hard and heavy against his cheek, her body pulsing against his.

"Mm, not here, Super Spy," she murmured. "Read the article. Then we'll go home."

A little information for sex. Fine.

He took another ragged kiss from her mouth and then let her go with narrowed eyes. "I'm warning you, Beckett. Pull another stunt like that-"

"And what? I'm kicked off the team?"

Her evil laughter followed him back to the alcove.

* * *

"You liked it?" she asked.

She didn't normally allow for this - the talking in bed, the cozy chitchat - but Agent Castle had a way of breaking all her rules.

He laughed. "Oh, yeah."

He laid with his head pillowed on her thigh, his body stretched between her legs, and she couldn't help stroking her fingers lightly through his hair, buzzing and sated and - happy. She was happy.

Shit.

Castle smiled against her skin and lifted his head, blinking hazily at her, and then crawled up her body to lie beside her. "More than liked - that was fantastic. And kinda kinky, Beckett."

She hummed, still wordless in the spell of that untimely revelation of happiness from her admittedly-broken psyche, and let him drape himself over her, all the blanket she needed even in the brittle cold air of his apartment.

"Your mother," she said finally, needing to hang on to _something._

He grunted and his grip on her waist tightened, digging into her hipbone. She bruised him; he bruised back. It worked.

"Can we not-"

"You get to ask me personal, intimate questions like _Where was your father that night?_ and I can't do the same?" she said quietly.

"You didn't ask me where my father was-"

"Don't be cute," she muttered, felt him grin in response.

"You think I'm cute?"

"Ug, no. Cute is for babies. I think you're hot," she smirked, felt him shift against her in arousal. She liked that, liked it a lot.

"Admit it," he whispered. "You _do _think I'm cute."

"No."

"And we'd have cute babies too."

"Shit, Castle. I told you to stop-"

"And I said I don't want to talk about my mother. I don't want to discuss my mother. I don't _care_ what happened to her."

Babies for his mother? Hmm. . .she might be willing. She might-

Shit. No. Who was she kidding? She would never be willing to talk about kids with him. That was ridiculous - and a surefire way of making herself shut down.

But his mother. . .

"Fine," she sighed, wrapped her arm around his shoulders to pull him against her. "Your kids would be cute."

He laughed and lifted his head from her, eyebrows dancing. "Beckett. Our kids. _Our_ kids."

"You are crazy, you know that? We have no _time_ for kids."

"But they'd be cute."

She rolled her eyes and felt his fingers slip along her ribs, trying to tickle her. "I'm not ticklish. Give it up."

"No way. You just said my kids would be cute - means you've thought about it. What else are you lying about?"

"I have _not_ been thinking about-"

"With my eyes, right?" he pushed right through. "Your mouth, my eyes. Adorable."

She groaned and shook her head. "You have entirely killed the mood."

"You started it."

She grinned wickedly. "Oh, yes. Your mother. Let's move on to that now, shall we?"

"Not only is the mood killed, it's been maimed and left in a freezer, Beckett."

She laughed at that, felt that stupid, silly _joy_ lifting up in her chest. It was all out of proportion to the last three weeks' ragged edge of grief and rage she'd been drowning in - like a whirlpool in the ocean, an inverted typhoon swallowing her whole.

"Those are my kind of murders, Castle."

He sighed and his mouth traveled slowly over her chest, up her neck to her jaw.

"What happened to maimed?" she muttered.

"You said it was your kind of-"

She lifted her knee and dislodged him, laughing even as he huffed. "Your mother. You read the article."

"So."

"So she tried to support the both of you-"

"Speculation."

"Hear me out."

"I don't have to know-"

"Castle," she insisted, not sure why she was. Maybe because she wanted a partner in the swirling depths of emotional imbalance. Maybe it was just that misery loved company - nothing more.

Maybe she wanted to do for him what he was doing for her.

To her. Not for her. Doing to her.

Right.

"Castle, she had you in April of 69-"

"We could try _that_-"

"Focus. And not on my body," she growled, dragging the sheet up with her foot. He stilled her movement, scooted closer instead. All her rules - broken. Every last one of them.

"Okay, okay. Focused. But later on your body?"

"She had you in April-"

He groaned. "Dead, dying, dead. Maimed. Mutilated bits of carcass-"

"She went back to the stage the next year, tried to reprise her role-"

"To some success," he sighed, and now his cheek was against her shoulder, his body still tense but at least a little more willing.

"To some. But the article mentioned rumors. It's likely that everyone in the business knew she'd been pregnant and unwed."

He was silent, and she sighed, stroked her fingers up his spine.

"Castle I searched the _Times_ for three years after that and found no mention of her."

His body seemed to tense against hers, nearly imperceptible. So he was listening then.

"I did find a review in a smaller magazine, _Off-Off_, which mentioned a Mary Rodgers in a couple of different low-budget productions. No idea if that's her."

"What are you trying to say?"

"I think she tried," Kate murmured, drew her lips to his forehead and pressed a kiss there. "I think she must have tried. To keep you. But no one wanted to hire an actress who had baggage - who was chained to a baby-sitter or who needed to bring her toddler with her to rehearsal-"

"All speculation," he roughed out, but she could feel him swallowing hard, feel the clutch of his fingers at her hip.

"It is," she admitted. "Complete speculation. And I've only gotten to 1973 in the archives. She left when you were. . ."

"Five."

"Five," she breathed out, again found herself being taken over by the image of a little boy on the steps of his private school, waiting for his mother's taxi, maybe sitting on top of his suitcase, chin in his hands, staring mournfully down the road. "You're right, Castle."

"What - right about what?"

"Your eyes. They'd all have your eyes."

* * *

He flipped the pancakes and smiled widely, pleased with himself.

"I'll domesticate you yet," she murmured, her body suddenly pressing close at his back. She kissed the bare skin of his shoulder. "I'll never understand how you can always be so damn warm. It's freezing in here and you're walking around shirtless."

"Well, you're walking around in _only_ my shirt. That keeps me plenty warm, Beckett."

She pinched his side and moved around the range to sit at the lone bar stool in front of it. "If you don't turn up the heat, I'm gonna have to put on pants."

He dropped the spatula into the pan and hurried for thermostat. "Wouldn't want that. It'd be a crime to hide those legs."

She snorted at him, but he did actually nudge the temperature up a little more, heard his heat kick on. He kept it cool because he liked it cool, but a nice side benefit was the way she burrowed into him in bed, their skin pressed together. So he was reluctant to permanently alter the presets.

"Your pancakes are burning."

He ran back to the stovetop and cursed as his fingers burned on the spatula, hissed and yanked the pan off the burner. "Crap. I was doing so well."

"You were," she said sympathetically, sneaking another slice of strawberry. "But Castle. You have fruit. You've already wowed me. So don't worry about it."

He scraped the crispy edges off the pancakes and added them to the stack already on the plate. He hadn't realized his methods had been so transparent. He _was_ trying to impress her - he wanted this permanently, and even though she wasn't resistant to his six months off, he definitely knew she was resistant to anything more.

She said it didn't work between law enforcement professionals.

Of course, he'd gone straight to the CIA's secure location and looked up which law enforcement professional it hadn't worked out with. Asshole. Sorensen. FBI. No wonder.

Castle sighed to himself and pulled butter out of the fridge, grabbed the syrup from the counter, and placed everything in front of her. "Here you go. I'll eat the burned ones eventually."

"I don't mind," she said, shrugging. "Come sit."

"I only have one stool."

"Then stand," she huffed, rolling her eyes at him. "And eat with me. I hate it when you just watch."

He grinned back and leaned in to kiss her mouth, taste a little of those strawberries she'd been snacking on. Her fingers coasted at his jawline.

"I like to watch," he murmured. "You're sexy. And sometimes, entirely without meaning to be, you're adorable."

"You lie," she said heatedly.

He grinned, repressed the laughter, but there was a spark in her eyes too, even though they were narrowed. "Eat your food."

"Are you eating too?"

He shrugged. He'd try, but he'd spent so much of his life on a strict diet - the rigorous training schedule and the lean proteins, healthy fats of the nutritionist's plan for all the field operatives. Of course, his father's discipline gave it an added element of rigidity that he was slow to shake, even after five weeks.

"Come on, Ricky," she teased, arching her eyebrow at him. "Try a bite."

"Did you dump syrup on it already?"

"No," she hummed. "No butter yet either. But I can make you want it."

He'd have eaten anyway, just to be companionable, but it was better like this, her teasing the food in front of him, wicked and alluring. He knew of a few places he'd gladly lick syrup-

"Won't hurt you; I promise. You have no body fat on you, Castle, and a few carbs isn't gonna make a difference."

"You still going to want me when I'm tubby?" he asked mournfully.

She laughed and shook her head. "No. Not a bit."

"Then this is an evil plan to sabotage our relationship and I won't be party to it."

Her grin was wide, a little pleased, a little. . .tender, maybe? She'd gotten used to him, hadn't she? _His_ plan was working.

Maybe too well, since she seemed insistent on finding his mother, like she had the right to splay out the guts of him-

Okay. Well, maybe he saw the similarities. He was doing the same to her.

* * *

"You missed a spot," he murmured.

She watched him lick syrup from her thumb, felt the slick abrasion of his tongue travel down her nerve endings like razor wire. His eyelids were heavy when he looked at her, and she danced her fingertips across his jaw, leaned in to kiss his sweetened mouth.

"Mm, didn't miss a thing," she hummed back, smirking at him when his breath hitched. "Like syrup now, don't you?"

"Definitely can see the appeal. And you're sticky," he grinned, nipping at her thumb again, swirling his tongue over the spot. "You done yet, cause I want to take you back to bed."

"No syrup in bed."

"You don't need syrup, Beckett."

She grinned at that, couldn't help it, and drew his hips into the vee of her legs, tighter, closer, so that the hard length of his thighs pressed hers apart. "I'm done with pancakes, if that's what you mean."

Against her neck, he growled something she couldn't understand - could only feel - and it made her back arch, her body aligning with his as he lifted her off the bar stool.

"Hurry," she murmured.

* * *

"We gonna make it out of this bed today?" she said against his collarbone, sighed into the heat of his skin.

"Why should we?" he grumbled, his arms tightening around her. She liked it though. Didn't know why, just - liked the way her flesh seemed to melt into his, unable to move, safe.

He could draw his weapon and bring down an armed suspect faster than she could - they'd gone head to head on the CIA's virtual trainer, and then once more on the NYPD's module, to her defeat - and he had some kind of self-defense skills that exceeded her Krav Maga (she didn't know _what_ and he'd declined to say), and he was sniper certified.

Safe was putting it mildly.

It wasn't only that she didn't need to worry about that kind of thing - he could hold his own as a partner - but she didn't worry about him disappearing when she wasn't there. Not that she thought he'd purposefully disappear, he'd been clear on that, but just-

Arg. She wanted him. Shit, she wanted him and she wanted him around, for later, for life, for whatever, and it helped knowing that he was so damn capable.

He could be rated most likely to succeed on any mission he undertook. Which meant he'd. . .

come back to her.

Shit.

How was this happening to her?

She didn't _need_ any-

"I don't want to talk about my mother," he said suddenly, his arm squeezing around her shoulders. "But maybe I see what you're doing here."

"What?" Beckett lifted her head from his shoulder to look at him. He had his eyes on the ceiling.

"Turn about fair play, right? I know. I'm digging into your past, so. . .yes, you have the right to dig into mine."

She pushed up to her elbows and it made him cast his eyes down to her; the deep pit of grief in them nearly swallowed her.

And then it was gone. Masked behind the iron curtain of his learned self-control. His father's doing - the discipline, his training, his rigid schedule. She'd made him depart from so much of that - jeez, she'd just gotten him to eat pancakes and lick syrup-

Well, she was good for him; she could see it. But he was _letting_ her be. He was allowing it to happen.

And what was she doing? Clamping down on him at every turn, ignoring his questions, her help recalcitrant at best, deceitful at worst. She lured him away from the hard parts with sex, and sex wouldn't sort out her life.

(Castle wouldn't sort out her life either. But-)

"Okay," she breathed out. "Deal. I dig through yours, you dig through mine."

"We'll be even."

* * *

"I'd rather be in bed," she huffed, but she followed at his side through the dark bowels of the safe location.

"You're the one who wanted to know the _moment _I found anything-"

She sighed and shoved on his shoulder, moving him not an inch, his body still rock hard and at attention even so deep in his lair. "I didn't mean for you to get an app for your phone that would alert you every second-"

"It's handy."

"It's annoying," she groused. "It wakes me up nearly every hour."

"You're too sensitive."

"Or you're not sensitive enough-"

His fingers skittered at her neck and dipped below her shirt, making her arch, breath leaving her on a gasp.

"I think we're both _sensitive_, wouldn't you say, Beckett?"

Shit, he did that so easily. She grunted something as he squeezed her hip, wondered when exactly it'd gotten this bad.

"At least the hood stayed home. Where it belongs."

He let out a strangled chuckle at that, gave her a raised eyebrow even as he unlocked the door with his key card. "You would say that."

"You loved it."

His face split wide into a grin that transformed him - badass to breathtaking - and she stumbled to a stop beside him with her heart beating too hard in her chest.

"Here," he said, nudging her inside his office. She moved at the touch of his fingers to her back, tried to keep a discrete distance from him just to tamp down on the flame of arousal that lit through her whenever he turned soft.

"So what did you find?" she said brusquely, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Don't know yet. That was just the alert for the computer search query. Results returned."

He bent over his workstation, the sleek Apple computer with its wide screen waking up at the touch of his finger. He shouldered her out of the way, his back blocking her view, and input his password to unlock it.

"Secrets, secrets," she murmured, smirking at his back, unable to help trailing a finger at his bicep.

"State secrets, Detective." He turned to look at her over his shoulder, smirking back, and the crackle of awareness made her sway towards him.

Thankfully, he didn't seem to notice, just resumed working at his computer, hunched over it as he scanned the information on whatever program it was that he'd done the query. He wouldn't even tell her that much, and it was frustrating to be on the outside edge of her mother's case, watching him do the work and unable to control even-

He shifted to one side and stood, suddenly close to her, how proprietary he was with her, how his hands had to touch and his hip bump hers and his space invade her own. And how she absolutely despised herself for _craving_ it.

"Beckett."

She glanced away from the wide curve of his palm and towards the computer screen, undone, but he was taking her by the shoulders in a fierce grip.

"We'll find him. I swear to you. We will get to the bottom of this."

What?

Oh. He thought she was-

Wait.

"What did you find?" she hoarsed out, knowing it was arousal but letting him go on believing it was vengeance.

"Sit down," he said quietly and pushed on her shoulders to guide her into the chair. She shook him off, stepped away, faintly becoming aware of the roar, the clamoring alarms that were going off in her head.

She stared at his computer screen until the results began to make sense.

"There were - are - others?" she whispered.

"Beckett. I - It's - a professional killer."

"What?" she gasped, felt her knees turning to water. She fought to stay standing, to not need that damn chair, and she grabbed the mouse to open the first case.

"This guy. Wait. I know him. A clerk. A judge's clerk or - I don't know, but he's _related_ to my mom's case. And this-"

"Beckett. Look at the number. Thirty-eight victims matching the knife wounds-"

"Oh my God."

"-mean this is a hired killer. The medical examiner I talked with noticed that there are no hesitation marks - that the pattern is not random but actually methodically executed-"

"Are you saying - are telling me that someone put a hit out on my mother?" she growled.

"Yes. Beckett. I'm saying. . .yes. A hired killer did this. I suspected as much when I first saw the file, but I couldn't be sure. I didn't want to say anything until we got the results."

She paced hotly to the other end of his office, burning, came back to round on him. "You _thought _my mother had been murdered by an assassin and you said _nothing_-"

"Kate," he said, grabbing her by the back of the neck and pulling her against him.

She gripped the hard, dangerous line of his biceps and dug in, let her nails break his skin because he could damn well take it and she hated him, hated this massive, manhandling asshole who-

"Kate," he murmured, his mouth close to hers, glancing across her cheekbone with an infinite patience that only made her more furious.

"The damn son of a bitch who did this-"

"We will find him. That's a given. What I don't know - what I can't promise, Kate - is the man who ordered the hit. . ."

She stiffened but his fingers were caressing her neck, his thumb at her jaw, his mouth hovering over hers in an attempt to soften her.

And it was working, despite herself. She could feel her body respond to him, conditioned to his touch, the call of his hands, even as a brilliant and fierce and destructive black arose in her. Black. Everything was being sucked right out into the maelstrom.

Until he put his mouth on hers.

Lightly, barely a kiss at all, just the sweet brush of his lips against hers and the fine, delicate way his too-big hands cradled her face. The adoration of his kiss, the tenderness, broke into her like light.

"Castle," she moaned, felt the tremor run through as she broke apart.

"I will do everything in my power to help you end this, Kate Beckett. You have everything."


	3. Chapter 3

**Close Encounters 2**

* * *

She clicked through the case summaries that Castle had emailed her from his results. Jennifer Stewart, Diane Cavanaugh, Scott Murray.

And Johanna Beckett.

Those three though - she'd never discovered that information before, that there were others in the city murdered around the same time as her mother. Thirty-four other victims as well - scattered far and wide for the last ten years, about as disperse as Castle's own adventures.

Was her mother's murderer a spy too? Was _that_ how Castle thought he'd recognized the pattern? Was the killer someone Castle _knew_?

He had let her sit at his computer for five hours, and then he'd forcibly removed her, driven her home himself. No hood. He hadn't even asked her to close her eyes. She'd spent the drive in a daze, but it wasn't like she couldn't get back there. He trusted her.

She trusted him.

Castle didn't know who he was, but he'd seen the knife wounds, and he knew of other victims. Or else, he expected other victims to exist.

Three other people connected to her mother. How had she missed this? How had she ever-

"Hey, boss, we got the search warrant," Ryan called out.

She jerked to attention at her desk, fumbled with her computer to minimize her email, and stood up. "Yeah. Let's roll, boys."

* * *

Richard Castle's stomach dropped out when his hand met the unresisting metal of Beckett's front door.

He pushed on inside even as he drew his weapon, the buzz of white noise in his ears that was his blood rushing with grim adrenaline.

She was on the floor.

Hands and knees, crawling towards a photograph, gathering it toward herself and biting at the soft skin of her thumb. She sank back on her haunches and reviewed the scattered mess in front of her, not even noticing he was there.

Her door had been unlocked. And here she was, working her mother's case.

Castle stood in the entryway, watching the hunched line of her back, his gun dangling at his side, shock flooding him.

He couldn't speak. Couldn't even move. Could only watch Beckett chew on the pad of her thumb, grit her teeth when she reached to shuffle around another piece, drown in the depths of the timeline.

Her hair had fallen around her face, swung out every time she rocked forward, one more photo, one more index card. Two file folders were messily splayed before her, and she clutched at the edge of one, pressed her hand over her eyes as he stood watching.

How long before she noticed he was here at all?

* * *

She groaned when he gripped her by the shoulders, tried to pull away from him. "Castle."

"You need to at least do this at the table, Beckett."

She grunted and jerked away, squatted back down on the floor with the case file spread out-

"Beckett. At the table. Up, up, up." He dragged her back to her feet and she hissed as the edge of the folder sliced her finger.

"Damn it, Castle. What are you-"

"At least sit at the table," he muttered, manhandling her towards her dining room table. She pushed forward when he let her go, but he lifted a hand. "I'll get it. You sit."

She scraped a hand through her hair and glared at him, refusing to sit until he came back with all the pieces of her mother's case. He didn't even look ashamed of himself, ordering her around, and she crossed her arms over her chest, furious and wordless in her fury.

"Here," he said, putting the last of it on the table. "I can even sit here and help you rearrange it just like you had it. The timeline, right? Sit with me, Beckett."

"When did you get here?" she asked, gritting her teeth against him.

"About an hour ago," he said quietly.

She winced and rubbed her forehead. An hour ago? She hadn't even _noticed_ him walk into her apartment?

"Beckett. The door was unlocked."

"Shit."

"Sit with me," he whispered, stepping closer, hands up like he was surrendering to her. "Just sit with me."

"I have _got_ to figure this out," she muttered, eyes drifting away from him towards the case jumbled up over her dining room table. "The timeline for Cavanaugh's murder compared with my mom's just doesn't-"

"Kate."

Her gaze snapped back to him, her body shivering the tenderness in his voice, the way he caressed her without even touching her.

"Castle, I need to-"

"Kate," he murmured again and his body seemed to crowd hers, over her, around her, deep and male and solid. She lifted her hands to his arms, clutched his biceps, but couldn't manage to push him away.

His lips came to her forehead, pressing into her skin, and then his hands were cradling her face, smoothing over her cheekbones until her eyes closed.

"I need. . .need this," she whispered.

"You do. I know you do. You need this too," he said softly and then his mouth was covering hers and drawing her up, up, up into all that strong, good, solid warmth.

* * *

Castle met with the medical examiner one more time, just to be absolutely certain, and then he started tracking squad movements. There had to be an original victim, an initial murder which started the assassin on his road to professional killing. Most soldiers didn't have the kill instinct - it was training and conditioning, combat games and warfare scenarios.

But someone - probably Special Forces or a Marine - someone had more kills on their record, perhaps even a clouded reputation in the group, maybe even a complaint lodged against him. And then that person would match up geographically with the contract kills - the stabbed victims.

Lately, there'd been an increase in moral deferments - convicted felons allowed into the services because the armed forces needed the increase in ranks. He was guessing this guy was probably one of those, so he was checking there first.

It would take all night, even running the query on the command center's super computer. He wasn't exactly supposed to be here, and they _would_ tell his father, but he'd get by with it. He always did.

So much of his work was computer searches and routine surveillance. Beckett liked his wild stories out in the field, but he knew she was having trouble with the cold, plodding work. Which was strange - it wasn't all that different from her own job.

While his variables for the search were detailed, it probably wasn't enough. He'd still get sixty or more possibles and have to weed through them slowly. It'd take time.

Castle sighed and rubbed his forehead, tapped his fingers against the desk. He wished he had a way to speed this up; Beckett needed to not be doing this much longer.

He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and scanned the geographic map of the victims. Four in New York City in 98-99 - her mother - and then a handful in Philly a few months later, twelve over five years in Iran, Kuwait, during the first Gulf War-

Okay, that put another parameter on it; he could focus on that. Castle called up the search program and wrote a simple code for those years, concentrated on the screen for a moment to make sure he wasn't overlooking something.

A vet of the Gulf War then. At least that was something-

His phone rang, startling him, and Castle huffed out a breath, tugged his phone from his pocket.

Great. His father. Someone had already ratted him out.

"Agent Black."

"Richard," the man greeted him smoothly. "About these locations."

Locations?

"Sir?"

"Eastman said you passed the report on to him?"

Ah, right. "Yes, sir. I'm on sabbatical."

"But you're at the office right at this moment, Richard."

He sighed and scraped a hand down his face. "Personal."

"This is about that woman-"

"Detective."

"Detective," Black gave. "You're working on something for her. Her mother's murder."

"You did a background check on her," he said quietly, narrowing his eyes at the screen. Of course his father had. Of course.

"Of course," Black said, as if waving it off as unimportant. "You do realize that pattern of knife wounds-"

"I got it. I'm handling it."

His father took in a long breath - Castle knew it as barely controlled frustration, had heard it often enough over his lifetime.

"Richard. I need you on these locations. Foley could be-"

"Eastman has it. It's his now."

Castle hung up the phone, pushed away from the desk.

Eastman had it. He did. Foley was a long-shot, always had been; he'd been chasing that ghost since he started.

Wouldn't find Foley now, not on just that scrap of information.

And Beckett needed this.

* * *

Castle paused two blocks before his apartment building, stepped into the shadows of a condominium's entrance. That sense of _not right_ persisted though, and he eased against the concrete facade, crossed his arms over his chest as if he were waiting on someone.

He called Beckett.

"Hey, I'm in the middle-"

"I need your help," he said quickly. "It'll only take a moment."

He heard her intake of breath and then a sharp agreement. "Okay. Shoot."

"You at the 12th or out?"

"Out."

"Check your rear view mirror, Beckett."

"I'm walking-"

"Then look behind you," he sighed. "Just do it."

He heard her huff of breath and then the scrape of her hair against the phone. "Huh."

"What?"

"I might have a tail."

Shit. "I definitely do. You got your team with you, Detective?"

"I don't need-"

"Humor me."

"Espo is with me."

Former Army guy with the shaved head, lots of rampant machismo. Yeah, that would work. "Good. Then nothing to worry about. I'm gonna ditch my shadow and see what's up. If you don't hear from me in say - six hours? then-"

"No, no. Wait. What do you mean, if I don't hear from you?"

"Gonna run a little recon, Beckett. You worried about me?"

"No," she spat out.

He grinned to himself and ducked into the condominium's lobby. "Uh-huh. Six hours, Beckett. And then you press the panic button."

* * *

"Turned out to be nothing," he said with a shrug.

Beckett watched him carefully, sliding the index card over to him. Scott Murray, all his pertinent details. He took it from her and placed it in the layered story board he'd created on her dining room table.

"Bullshit," she said finally. "Why did _I_ have someone following me?"

He lifted an eyebrow and took the second victim's card from her. "You're with me. Nothing more to it."

"Am I supposed to be worried?"

"Naw."

She crossed her arms and studied him again; he carefully met her eyes. Too carefully.

"Bullshit," she said softly, shaking her head at him. "If it's state secrets, fine. You don't have to tell me. But at least be honest about the trouble I'm in with you."

"With me? You're always in trouble, Beckett."

She snorted at that. "You trying to distract me?"

He grinned and came around the table for her, sliding his arms at her waist, tucking her hips into his. She narrowed her eyes at him and he leaned in, pressed his mouth to her cheekbone, the corner of her eye. Too tender, too soft.

"Are _you_ in trouble?" she asked, breathing into his kiss, that flutter in her chest again.

"Never in trouble. Man of action, Detective."

"Certainly that," she whispered.

"How about a time out here?" he murmured, fingers caressing her jaw, dropping to her clavicles and disappearing under the collar of her shirt. "No more case, no more spies."

"But we're close-"

"You and me, Kate," he breathed out. "Nothing else."

* * *

Beckett took the next exit when her GPS called for it and checked her rear view mirror again for tails, startling when her phone rang into the silence. She cursed herself for her nerves and thumbed on the phone. "Beckett."

"Hey, where are you?"

"You're the spy, Castle; you tell me."

"Oh, ha ha. Already bending the rules for you, Kate Beckett."

Her lips quirked at that, but she checked her rear view mirror and the GPS again. "I'm upstate. Chasing down a lead. What's up?"

"Oh," he sighed. "I thought we could. . .do dinner."

"Like a date?" she laughed. "Aren't we past that?"

"Never past a date, Beckett. You in a fancy dress, those sinfully high heels-"

"Are you thinking date, or Bond girl here, Castle?"

He laughed over the line and she grinned to herself.

"Bond girl works for me," he murmured, his voice suddenly rich and alluring. She caught her breath and squeezed the steering wheel, glad when her GPS instructions intruded.

"Castle, I gotta go. I should be back in the city late, but if you want to wait for me. . ."

"Yeah. I can do that."

She smiled to herself, bit her bottom lip to keep from looking ridiculous, even when no one else could see.

"See you tonight," she said, and then hung up.

Beckett took a long breath in and checked the map once more. She was chasing a lead all right, but it wasn't for a case.

She was headed to meet Castle's family.

* * *

Montauk, New York, was a world apart. Long stretches of pristine beach and nature conservancy thick with forests went hand in hand with bed and breakfasts, resorts, and waterfront restaurants. She parked at the public library and got out, shivering in the chill.

She stood in the parking lot for a moment, studying the rounded white-clapboard building with its black shutters and protruding windows. She went on inside, stepping through the metal detectors at the front entrance and heading for the information desk.

The historical society had a display here about the Rodgers family of Montauk, and while she wasn't interested in Castle's 17th-century ancestors, she hoped to get a feeling for their place in this East Hampton community.

When she asked, the librarian showed her to The Historical Reference Collection, where she found a stack of primary sources and was given soft, white gloves. As a police officer, she was allowed to be alone with the material, so Beckett shut the door after the librarian and sat down at the table.

The library had collected the information she'd asked for, and after a few quick scans of text and family ledgers, she began to see a pattern. Monied, storied, a dramatic flair to centuries worth of scandal and success. A black sheep every generation, and it seemed that Martha Rodgers was theirs.

She'd left Montauk at sixteen, never to return, no more mentions, no more references, nothing. They'd written her out of the will, it seemed, and her name had been wiped from the story books.

Well.

No wonder she'd given up her son. Pride like that - she was left with no other choice.

* * *

Castle broke into her apartment and set everything up, excited about seeing her, probably a lot more excited than he should be. They hadn't yet actually been on a date, but he was wearing her down; she'd started to see it as a relationship and not just a convenient partnership.

He opened up the sauce and poured it into the pan, put it on low to simmer while he finished setting up her place. He took everything off her dining room table - every shred of her mother's case, every piece of evidence and sheaf of notes went in a stack next to the couch - and then he unfolded the tablecloth over the dining room table, smoothing it down with his palms.

He went back to the stove and stirred the sauce. He'd bought it premade; he didn't have the time or the skills to do much more than this. But he was learning. Slowly. Jeez, cooking seemed harder than taking out an enemy's base camp.

The water was boiling for the pasta, so he slid the noodles out of the box and dumped them in the pot, then hunted through her cabinets for salt. A little butter as well, and the pasta was on its way.

What next?

Oh, the vegetables. Okay, where did he put the. . .

Castle found his bag of groceries and pulled out the zucchini and squash, feeling suddenly unequal to the task. Thin slices and just stir fry them on the stovetop - that was all. He could do it. He'd faced down a North Korean assassin and hadn't even blinked but this was daunting.

Castle searched through Beckett's cabinets for the cutting board; he knew he'd seen her use it before, but where had she put it? Not with the cookie sheets, not under the pots, not. . .okay. Okay, it was okay. He could still do this.

He grabbed a cookie sheet and put the vegetables on it, used her good knife to start slicing. Maybe he went too fast, maybe it was nerves or anticipation that caused him to nick his knuckles. He was usually excellent with a knife.

Castle sighed and hustled to the sink, rinsing the blood off his fingers, wincing as the sting hit him. He was halfway through cutting the vegetables, but now he needed to find band-aids to finish.

Castle held his hand against his chest and went rooting through her bathroom for the bandages, antibiotic cream. His heart was pounding too hard, and he had to stop and rinse the blood off again, cursing himself for his clumsiness.

And that's when the key crunched in the lock and her door swung open. Castle tensed and opened his mouth to call out to her. "In here, Beckett."

He heard her dropping stuff in the entry, her huff of disapproval as she saw how he'd invaded her space, and then she was standing in the bathroom door, eyebrow raised.

"Hey," he said weakly, the water still running the blood off into her sink.

"What did you do?" she sighed, coming into the tight space of her bathroom and reaching for his hand.

He relinquished his injury to her, felt the sure touch, the carefulness as she spread out his fingers to study the cuts.

She lifted her eyes to look at him, lips pressed together. "You making me dinner, Agent Castle?"

"Trying to."

"Thought you told me you were a master with knives."

"I. . .yeah. You make me nervous."

That pressed-lip smile got away from her, a flicker of a real one that she hid as she ducked her head, studying his hand again. "Well. Let's get you some band-aids, and maybe let me do the knife-wielding?"

"Yeah," he sighed, his chest easing again.

"Come on, Castle. I've got you."

He took in a long breath and leaned into her, capturing her mouth with a soft, thankful kiss.

"Welcome home, Kate."

* * *

Beckett finished the vegetables in moments, slid them into the pan, added some olive oil and garlic salt, and then turned back around to the subdued man leaning against her center island.

"So, pasta, sauce, veggies. Pretty impressive, Castle. Despite the injuries."

He shrugged with a little somber sigh, fingers tapping against her counter as he propped himself up. She came closer, sliding her arms around his waist and leaning into him. She pressed a kiss to that sad mouth, teasing his lips apart until she felt his hands on her hips, warm and claiming.

He kept her close to him even when she leaned back with a smile, and his hands stroked up her ribs, tantalizing. "How was your day?" he murmured.

Kate laughed, shaking her head at him. "We do that now? The whole, _hi, honey, I'm home_?"

He grinned back. "Yeah. Why not?"

"You're not really an _I'm home_ kind of guy, Castle. And I'm not really a _honey._"

"You're pretty honey to me."

"Don't be an idiot," she laughed, but leaned in to kiss him again, tasting marinara on his tongue. "So my tail's gone. That recon last week - what'd you do, Castle? Spill."

"You haven't even plied me with wine and seduced me into your bed yet, Beckett."

"Do I really need to do that anymore?"

He hummed with laughter, his hands slipping under her shirt, racing up her spine, thumbs caught in her bra. "You could make the effort."

"How about we enjoy the effort _you_ made, eat our dinner, and talk about your spy stuff like any normal couple?"

"Ooh, are we a normal couple?" he breathed out, clutching her tighter.

"It was a joke." Beckett shook her head at him even as he caught her hair between his fingers, something a little too serious in his eyes. "Spy stuff is hardly normal, Castle."

"Normal for us."

"Normal enough," she sighed, giving in to the careful, deliberate way he touched her, looked at her, wanted her.

"All I'm asking," he whispered and leaned in to nudge his nose against hers. "Just give us a chance."

She stiffened, clutching his biceps, but he was already driving her back to the counter, his mouth relentless.

* * *

He had Kate Beckett straddling his lap at her dining room table, her hair teasing his neck as she worked her hands into his shirt. Dinner was over, done. Done, done, done. Oh wow-

"Kate," he gasped, hips rising to meet her hands. "Slow down."

She laughed - _laughed_ - and met his mouth with a kiss that curled his toes. Castle gripped her hips harder and pushed back from the table, rattling the silverware on their empty plates, and stood up.

She gasped and clutched him, her legs winding around his waist, and he buried his mouth at her neck, licked down the column of her throat until he made her whine.

He wasn't going to make it to her bed.

* * *

Beckett laughed softly and curled her knee up, rose over him on her floor. "Hey there, super spy."

"How are you not completely exhausted?"

"Shorter recovery time," she murmured, dropping low to press a kiss to his mouth. He was so solid and warm under her, so handsy too. She laughed again and wriggled away from him, getting to her feet and grabbing the throw rug off the back off the couch.

"Where are you going?" he groaned.

Kate leaned over, blanket draped around her shoulders, and reached out a hand to him. "Come on. You're supposed to be filling me in on your recon."

"Read you in," he murmured, getting to his feet with a groan. "That's what we say. Read you in."

She tossed one end of the blanket around his shoulders and tugged him in close, pressing their bodies together.

"So read me in, Agent Castle."


	4. Chapter 4

**Close Encounters 2**

* * *

"We camping out?" he murmured, curled around her body. "I like camping out with you."

"So after you doubled-back," she said, poking him with her elbow. "What happened then?"

"It wasn't a guy I recognized. I took a picture, sent it in to the office. Turned out to be an American NSA agent."

"Seriously?" she asked, turning over in his arms and pushing her fingers against his chin. He pulled back, watching her carefully. "Castle. The NSA. . .aren't you on the same team?"

"Not always."

Beckett sighed and that adorable frown was creasing her forehead, pursing her lips. He drew his hand up her back, over her shoulder so he could get to her face, stroke his fingers over that spot.

"Stop petting me," she muttered, catching his hand with hers and squeezing tight. But she shifted in bed, her knee lifting between them, and she came in closer, almost unconsciously. "So what's this about, Castle? NSA following you - me, as well?"

"Could be. I'm not sure what it's about," he said quietly. He dislodged her hand and curled his fingers at her neck, tangling in her hair. Her face was screwed up in concern, in concentration, and he leaned in to kiss her, lips so soft and giving, so good. She was so good.

Her hand came up but instead of pushing him away, she came closer, mouth open and seeking his. "When you find out. . ."

"You'll be the first to know," he whispered back, rolling forward to cover her body with his.

* * *

Beckett took the call from Montauk - the area code gave it away, her hand clenching around her phone.

"This is Detective Beckett."

"Detective? Oh my. I thought - well, you emailed me, Detective Beckett?"

"Yes. This is Harriet Rodgers?"

"It is. What is this about, Detective?"

"Just a few questions. Your name came up in an. . .on-going investigation," she said smoothly, lying but also not lying. She saw Esposito give her a look and she resisted the impulse to turn her back to him.

"An investigation? Oh my. How can I help you?"

Beckett cast her eyes down to her case notes, entirely unrelated to this, but she felt better having the support of her job around her - the creaky desk, the loud fan of her computer, the notes on the double homicide she'd nabbed this morning.

"Mrs. Rodgers, your husband, Baugh?"

"Baugh," she confirmed with a laugh. "Old family name, yes. His mother's."

Kate felt that hit her like a punch to the gut, knowing this snippet of Rodgers family history that Castle had absolutely no idea about. His grandmother's family name was Baugh.

"Baugh Rodgers is an only child?" she asked, pressing her lips together.

"Yes. I mean, no. Well, it's complicated."

"I have the time."

Kate heard her sigh over the line, and then her grunt of disapproval. "I'm sorry, Detective, what is this in relation to?"

Relation. Exactly. "Just asking a few questions, ma'am. I can't get into specifics. Mrs. Rodgers, what can you tell me about your husband's family?"

"Well, his parents are both dead. Baugh has taken over the business and our sons are set to follow in his footsteps. All very mundane stuff, Detective. Of course, his aunt hates the lot of us, but who doesn't have a crazy old aunt?"

"Aunt?" she breathed out.

"Althea Dixon. She's a massive pain in our necks - but all that went down before my time, really. What is this about, Detective?"

"I can't discuss it. Thank you. I'm sorry to have taken up your valuable time. I'll let you go."

Beckett ended the call, staring down at her phone.

Althea Dixon hated the rest of the Rodgers family? Then that was exactly where Beckett needed to start.

* * *

Castle pressed his palm to the engine of the black Kia, but the metal was cool to the touch. He frowned at the parking permit in the lower corner of the windshield: _Department of Defense_ _NSA Northeastern Region._

Were they really being so obvious? And right in front of Beckett's apartment building?

Castle juggled his grocery bag and pulled out his phone, thumbing in the passcode. He huffed out an involuntary laugh when he saw the main screen; Beckett had taken a photo of herself sticking her tongue out at him and she'd set it as the desktop picture.

Jeez. When had she gotten his passcode? He shook his head and glanced around the sidewalk, calling his father. When Black answered, Castle went right to it.

"I've got an NSA-tagged Kia in front of Beckett's apartment."

His father grunted. "License plate?"

"Kilo Whiskey Tango. Seven Zero Four Seven. New York plates."

"Huh. Running it. Call you back."

Castle pushed his phone into his pocket and headed into her building, using the key he'd made months ago, back when he'd been following her for information on his espionage case. He'd been keeping his skills up by picking her lock, but he felt the need to get in quick.

He checked her mail, old habit, put it back in her brass box lining the hallway, then started up the stairs. The bag of groceries was a surprise; he was seriously going to master this cooking thing. But she'd sounded distracted on the phone.

Which meant she was holed up in front of her mother's case. He'd checked her case log at the precinct, which yeah, okay, he should really stop poking his nose into her business, stop hacking her work computer; he knew that. She was going to find out and be so very pissed off at him for it, but it was seriously hard to stop being a spy.

He trusted her; he did. Even though it looked like he didn't.

Castle shoved his key into her lock, twisted the knob, and pushed open her front door. For a few seconds, he couldn't see her. The apartment was dark, poorly-lit with one pale bulb in the kitchen - a light that didn't extend much past the front entry. Castle dropped the grocery bag on the counter and shrugged off his jacket, heading for the living room.

"Hey, there you are," he murmured, finding her at the dining room table.

Spread out in front of Beckett were the elements of her mother's case. She had a sharpie in one hand and a second package of note cards open in the other. The contents of first package were strewn across the table, a scribbled mess of sixty different ideas, suggestions, questions. . .

"Kate," he said softly, coming up behind her.

She startled, dropping the notecards, and he pressed his fingers into the tense muscles at her shoulders.

"Hey. What are you doing here?" she asked, clearing her throat when her words came out rough and raw.

"Thought I'd make you dinner."

"I'm not really that hungry."

"It'll keep," he murmured, glancing across the mess of her dining room table with a flickering frown. She shrugged out from under his fingers and slid another card out of the stack - this one bright blue. For some reason, he'd been telling himself that the colorful notecards were a good sign, a positive thing, a symbol of cheerful hope.

But they were just notecards she'd had on hand, nothing more.

His phone vibrated and Castle brought it out again, unlocking it, his heart twisting at the silly picture of Kate on the screen.

A message from his father. He opened it and frowned. Kia was registered to an Albert Green. Fake name if he ever heard one. "Beckett, anyone been hanging around today?"

"Castle, what do you think about this?"

He lifted his head from his phone and saw the green note card she'd held up to him. _Scott Murray, Johanna Beckett, Diane Cavanaugh, Jennifer Stewart = Take Back the Neighborhood?_

"I don't know. I don't think trying to connect these victims is the way to go. I think we'll get further on the forensic details. Learning their stories. . .eh, it's nice, sure. But the real leads are in the medical examiners' reports, the knife wounds, the hard evidence."

She dropped the card and buried her hands in her hair with a moan that kicked him in the gut. Castle pocketed his phone and reached out for her again, wishing he could get back that woman on his screen - sticking her tongue out, happy, a little silly.

He kneaded her muscles with his fingers, felt the actual knots in her neck, the way her body shuddered at his touch. She dropped her head a little more and he ran the hard edge of his knuckles against the muscles that lined her spine, dug in.

"Shit, that feels good," she moaned.

He pressed his thumbs into her back, working his fingers into her shoulders, lowering his head to breathe a kiss to the nape of her neck. She shivered this time, goose bumps erupting, and turned her head into his cheek, one hand coming up to his face, fingers curling at his ear.

"Come lie down," he murmured softly, kissing her again and drawing his hands down her arms, tugging her up by her elbows.

Beckett dropped the marker, her fingers trailing over the notecards as she rose, and drifted towards her couch. He meant to have her on her bed, but this might be better, might be more of a help to her. She didn't need sex, she needed some actual sleep for once.

She sank into her couch gracelessly, and he wondered if she'd slept last night either; he couldn't even be sure she had slept the night before that, when they were together. He had the tendency to drop into unconsciousness the moment he was curled around her, so he couldn't be sure about her.

"Lie down, Beckett," he murmured, nudging her shoulder. She drew her legs up into the couch like a child and laid down, stretching out slowly, her cheek resting on the back of her hands. Her eyes slipped shut the moment he touched her shoulders.

Kneeling on the floor at her side, he spent a moment tracing the edges of her back with his fingertips, feeling her ribs beneath her shirt and seriously starting to wonder when she'd last eaten a real meal. Dinner when he'd brought pasta last Monday?

"Castle," she grunted, shifting slightly like she was going to get up.

"Take off your shirt," he said instead, already sliding it up her back.

She shivered and her dark eyes turned to his, arousal and lust and something so very black in them.

"No, love. Just a massage," he murmured.

She sat up to slip her shirt off, apparently saw the answering need in his eyes, and went for her bra, undoing in a second and staring down at him.

Castle swallowed and pressed his palm into her shoulder, pushed her back down to the couch. "Lie down, Beckett."

She huffed but he ground the heel of his hand into the curve of her back, right into the hard slope of her muscle. She groaned and sank into the couch and he lowered his head to press an open-mouthed kiss to her skin, just to keep her interested and willing beneath his hands.

A little deception to keep her there.

"Stay right here," he breathed out, stroking the hair away from her back. "I'm going to hunt up some lotion."

She hummed and turned her head to look at him. "It's in my bath-"

"I know where it is," he winked, couldn't help touching another kiss to her cheek, breathing her in. Sweat and desperation and a hint of cherry. "Be right back."

* * *

Beckett was only in black leggings, dressed for a night in, and she could feel the hungry roam of his eyes over her when he returned. She swallowed hard and pressed her lips together, but couldn't quite open her eyes. She'd curled an arm up at her side, her fingers on her lips, and behind her eyes ran tantalizing dreams.

She wanted him. So very badly. But she was so tired.

She heard the bottle of lotion opening, smelled its scent when he spread it over his hands. Castle kneeled down beside her again, and she opened her eyes to him, watched him attempt a smile. It was one of those that were usually so charming and disarming at the same time, but he had ceased to blind her with them for a few weeks now. She saw past the smile.

She frowned, opened her mouth to ask him what was wrong, but he reached for her, pressed his fingers deep into the muscles at her shoulders, and all thought ceased.

She groaned as his hands worked at her, the slick slide of lotion between their skins, the rough callous of his thumbs catching on her neck. She should be cold, topless on her couch, but her skin was on fire, her body heated from the inside out.

"Castle," she moaned, struggled to open her eyes, but it was so good. Too good. She couldn't resist.

His hands skied down her back, knuckles digging in so tight, so penetrating, and she writhed, her hips pressing against the couch, her breath caught in her chest. He used his elbows as well, leveraging into the top of her ass, the taut ridge at the side of her spine, and then back up again. Every push into her back made the air in her lungs escape on a pained breath, the slick slide of lotion and skin creating wonderful, amazing friction.

She melted into the couch, unable to move, unwilling to stop, and wished only, for some strange reason, that he would climb over her, let his body press her down deep, deep, deep.

* * *

Castle found the pair of sweatpants he'd left here last week, tugged them on, then stripped off his dress shirt so he could sleep in his undershirt. He brushed his teeth with his finger and her toothpaste, made a note to ask her where her extra toothbrush was. Later.

He scraped wet fingers through his hair, pushed it off his forehead, and then turned towards her bed. Throwing off the decorative pillows, he pulled down the covers to get it ready, then headed back to the living room and the sleeping Kate. Sometime after he'd gone, she'd curled up against the cold, both hands under her chin, and he stood over her for a moment.

He'd make her dinner whenever she woke, even if it was for breakfast.

Castle bent over and slowly depressed the couch cushions so he could slide his arm under her neck, then the other at her knees, and stood up with her. She mewled and shuddered on a slow breath but stayed asleep.

He walked slowly with her - to keep his balance and also to prolong the moment - and when he got to her bed, he laid her down carefully. She rolled into her pillow, her back to him, and he came in after her, curled up behind her, sliding his arms around her and pressing his forehead to the nape of her neck.

He breathed her in slowly, the overwhelming scent of musk and cherry blossoms, and pulled his knees up behind the back of her thighs, framing her. He felt her body sink into his, into the mattress, and he could finally let his eyes close.

* * *

She woke suffocated from a dream that made the world disjointed, but the heat of him was so close that her body oriented within moments, curled into it before she was aware.

And then she was. His breathing was heavy, deeper than she remembered, breaths coming so far between that she pressed her fingers to his lips just to make sure. Her hand trembled. The night felt wrong and her mind restless, like she'd slept but hadn't been able to still the questions. Even unconscious, she'd been wrestling with it.

Beckett slid out of bed without stumbling, moved for a tshirt in the darkness and pulled it on over her head, shivering. She padded out to the living room, hesitated at the kitchen, but went straight to the dining room table.

She could used some coffee, get her sluggish synpases sparking, but she hovered over the table, looking at the scattered index cards with dream-dazed eyes.

Take Back the Neighborhood intiative of her mother's. . .was there something in that? She couldn't see how Scott Murray fit into that, but the others - it was possible.

"Couldn't sleep?"

She jumped and turned around, saw Castle yawning as he came for her. She braced herself, but it wasn't enough to withstand the heavy, loose-armed hug that he draped over her, the sloppy kiss at her mouth, the hum in his throat as he stood there with her, bodies pressed together.

Melted togther, her own traitorous body warming to his, and her nose seeking that soft skin at his neck and collarbone, framed by the lines of his bones and the solid, assuring presence of his-

love.

Oh God.

Beckett clutched at his tshirt and buried her face against his chest, felt him sway with exhaustion around her.

"Go back to bed, Castle," she whispered, the raw quality of her voice making her throat hurt.

"What're you doing?"

"Came in for water," she murmured. "Got waylaid."

He huffed a breath of laughter against her temple and pivoted her towards the kitchen. "Then go. Come crawl in with me when you're done."

She felt the little shove at her shoulders and turned to look at him. He was already moving back to the bedroom, rubbing at his eyes with a fist like a sleepy little boy.

* * *

Castle wasn't a spy for nothing.

It was a risky move, but-

He waited in her bed, hoping against hope she'd come back on her own, lured here by sleep and him and. . .him.

He'd downplayed it, standing over her dining room table with her eyes constantly shifting back towards her mother's case; he'd pretended that whole _going to get a glass of water_ thing was a valid excuse, that he was cool with it, that her insomnia and her inability to just _put it down_ was okay.

But it wasn't okay. She was scaring him now. She was actually slipping out past the point where he could reach her, and he didn't know how to bring her back.

He couldn't bring her-

And then the mattress dipped under her fist and Kate Beckett was crawling into bed with him, easing into his back with her cold fingers, colder toes, and Castle turned over to meet her, his chest tight with relief.

She had her eyes closed, her head bowed towards him, and he took her lead, let himself dangle over the edge of sleep once more.

His gambit had paid off.

* * *

Castle woke with Kate Beckett sleeping on top of him, his heart pounding, his body alert, and the roaring adrenaline of sensed danger singing in his blood.

Gun. Where was his-

He slapped his hand out and crashed into the bedside table, her bedside table, shit-

She grunted and shifted as if waking; he rolled her off of him and dropped his feet to the floor, crouched low as he felt along the top of her table for his weapon.

And then he heard the slow, careful snick of a door opening.

Shit.

_Albert Green, my ass._

"Beckett," he breathed out, catching the edge of his holster and lifting it towards himself. "Beckett."

She hummed and blinked awake, the curling fingers of sleep still holding her. He knelt next to the bed and pulled the gun from its sleeve. She gasped and drew her knees up, made to rise.

"No." He hooked his arm around her neck and dragged her out of bed, towards himself on the floor. She found her feet easily, stayed still at his side.

"What's going on?"

"Get your gun," he murmured.

And then footfall, the creak of her wood floors, and everyone froze.

"Fuck," she breathed out at his neck. "Gun's on top of my dresser."

"And my phone," he said back, drawing his arm behind him to grip her waist. He glanced towards the windows, the moonlight spilling through. "I'll get them both."

"No," she bit out, her hand in a fistful of his shirt and tugging him back down. "Not in front of the window."

He glanced towards her bedroom door. "Got a lock?"

She nodded and scooted forward before he could grab her back, gone in a second and reaching up a hand to twist the lock. She crouched low and came towards him, a flash of teeth as she grinned.

"Bathroom," he said on a breath. Easiest place to defend, that narrow window would afford her escape if it came to it.

She shook her head. "Can't get out of there. Trapped."

"Window," he reminded.

"You won't fit," she hissed, punching him hard in the shoulder.

He narrowed his eyes back at her. "This isn't defensible-"

"I know that," she growled under her breath. "I'm getting my gun."

And without another word to him, she was rising up like a goddess in the moonlight, snagging her weapon and his phone and coming back down to him.

He gasped in a breath and lifted a shaky hand to her, clutched the back of her head by her hair and tugged her in against him. Fuck, she couldn't do stupid shit like that.

"Message your dad," she breathed out against his cheek.

He nodded, wordless and angry and grief-stricken for a thing that hadn't even happened, and fumbled with his phone.

She hadn't been cut down by a sniper's bullet. That two seconds of exposure and she was fine.

She was fine.

* * *

Beckett crept forward, felt his fist tighten in her shirt and haul her back. She elbowed him off and turned around to hiss at him.

"I am not sitting here like a civilian while someone ransacks my apartment," she growled, moving to crouch forward again.

He came with her, having her back, and she reached up to quietly turn the knob of her bedroom door. He was breathing down her neck, but he put an eye to the crack in the door and nodded, pulling it open with two fingers so very slowly.

They took the hallway standing up, moving cautiously, but Beckett paused when he did, then saw the outline of her front door closing softly and the shadow disappearing.

"Go, go, go," she hissed, pushing on him to get moving.

They sprinted for her front door, Castle yanking it open in a low crouch, Beckett spilling out after him, weapons raised. No one in the hall.

"Stairs," he said softly, already shifting towards the stairwell door.

They went together, opened up the door only to hear another one closing far off. Too late; he was already escaping.

Beckett took the stairs two at a time, pausing every now and then to listen, make certain the guy hadn't doubled back. When they got to the ground floor, she head checked the lobby and then came through with her gun raised, expecting an ambush.

But there was nothing, and the front door was closed and locked, as usual. Castle came up at her side and they took it together, but there was no one on the sidewalk either.

"He got away," she muttered.

"What was that about?" he said back, spinning slowly as he eyed either end of the street. Beckett put her weapon down, at her thigh, and scraped a hand through her hair. Her bare feet were freezing.

"Let me go see if anything was stolen," she muttered.

"My father messaged me-"

Just then, a discreet black Charger slid into view, another behind it. Out came Eastman - whom she knew - and a coterie of black-suited agents she'd never met before. Castle growled something and stepped forward to greet them.

"Situation contained. I need a grid search for a man wearing a black baseball cap, hoodie, black tennis shoes."

Beckett left him to it, heading back inside her building and for the stairs. She went up as quickly as possible and re-entered her apartment. Standing in the foyer, she swept her eyes carefully over her place.

No mess, nothing overturned. Books untouched. Her father's watch was still on the entry table where she'd plucked it off earlier that night. The guy hadn't even made it to the bedroom to search for valuables.

What was he looking for?

Beckett ghosted the kitchen, not touching anything, imagined she took the same path their burglar had. She remembered how Castle hadn't let her stand up in front of the windows and wondered if he expected assassins and-

Assassins.

Her mother's killer?

She moved quickly for the dining room table, felt her chest tighten as she stood over the timeline.

It'd been moved. A nearly imperceptible nudge here and there to each index card, making certain that every word was visible.

She heard her door open and spun around, bringing her weapon up before she knew what she was doing.

"Whoa, only me, Beckett." He had both hands raised, still gripping his gun, and only lowered them when she relented. "What's missing?"

"Nothing," she said hollowly, turning her head back to the timeline of her mother's case. "But I think he took a photo of the timeline."


	5. Chapter 5

**Close Encounters 2**

* * *

Castle crossed his arms as she slowly went through the index cards, his body still thrumming with misspent adrenaline. He wouldn't be able to fall back asleep, but he wished Beckett would.

"I've got my team canvassing the buildings on your block," he said, trying tug her back from the almost ritualistic way she was touching each card.

"Yeah."

"Not a robbery. Probably checking up on you - see how far you've come on your mom's case."

She nodded, fingertips tapping a green index card three times before moving on to the next one. Castle reached out and snagged her hand, turned her towards him. He was surprised when she came, only a small backward glance betraying her preoccupation.

"Means we're getting close," she said quietly.

"Could be." Suddenly the NSA presence meant something more to him. If a Special Forces guy was involved in this, then Castle could reasonably believe that the man behind the contract on her mother was equally prestigious, important.

That meant someone in the government or military, someone in the Department of Defense or the Pentagon. Someone that even Agent Castle might have trouble going up against.

"That Kia parked on your street," he said quickly, gripping her by the shoulders.

She shrugged him off and headed for her couch, rubbing her temples with her fingers. "The Kia parked. . .oh, yeah. I see what you mean. NSA parking sticker. Weird, I know, but that guy's been here nearly as long as I have."

He followed her, sitting at her side; she actually leaned into him, pressed her cheek to his shoulder like she was letting herself need him.

He cupped her jaw. "Nearly as long."

"Mm, I've had this place since I was stationed at the 12th - nearly since I graduated the Academy. I think I started noticing the Kia - well, no, there's always been a NSA car, but it's not always been a Kia."

"So he lives in your building?"

"I don't know. My assumption was yes, my place or the one across the street."

"You ever see the guy?"

"Hm, no? No. Huh. Actually, no. Not at all."

"Not that strange for New York City. I haven't met a single one of my neighbors."

"I met the woman on the second floor where you live," she said quietly. "Nice-"

"No, you didn't," he groaned, tilting his head back on the couch. "Shit. The building's empty but for me, Beckett."

"What? But she-"

"No. No one." He sighed and rubbed a hand down his face, sat back up again to think about this, felt her shift at his side with a grunt. "So. A woman at my place, checking it out I guess. Could be part of this, could be old business."

"Old business. My first thought tonight was the Chinese, that it could be anyone you've crossed. Anyone. But instead, Castle, it's my stuff. My mother's case is putting you at risk."

"Goes with the territory." He frowned. "When you graduated the Academy did you make it known you were investigating your mother's case?"

She nodded, and then he felt her body catch, her fingers grip his forearm. "Are you asking - you mean he's a plant. He's here to watch me. Same as the woman at your place. They're watching us, Castle."

He turned to look at her, the pale profile of her face in the dim light of her apartment.

"Yeah. I think - I think they might be."

* * *

Beckett stepped into the hotel room and toed off her shoes, moving to one side so Castle could come in behind her. He carried her suitcase inside and laid his hand on her shoulder, thumb pressing into her neck.

She sighed and carefully placed the messenger bag on the small, round coffee table, unzipped it to get at the contents. Her mother's case, all of it.

"Unpack, first?" he asked, bypassing her to put the suitcase on the floor at the foot of the only bed in the room.

She shrugged. "That's what I'm doing."

She heard his strangled laugh, and then felt his arm come around her waist, tugging her back from the case notes.

"Coffee table's not much better than the floor, Beckett."

She huffed back, tried to untangle herself from his grip, but he was determined. "Castle. I need to-"

"Sleep. You need to sleep. I need to sleep. Got a team downstairs stationed at the exits; we're safe for now. Tackle it in the morning."

She wanted to say something about the energy still buzzing in her body, the jittery length of her hands, but it felt better to inhale the woodsy cologne of him, the way his body rippled with hard muscle as he pushed her towards the bed.

She went because she was exhausted in some clamoring part of her brain, completely done in, and he was just tender enough to convince her. The curl of his palms at her hip and her shoulder, the brush of his thumb just at the ridge of muscle along her neck, the warmth of his body crowding hers - it seduced her towards sleep.

Beckett dropped to the bed and crawled over just enough to allow him in behind her, heard the clunk of his shoes hitting the floor. She turned and watched him settle in; she put her cheek to the pillow, hand curled at her chest. Castle mirrored her position, still in the tshirt and sweatpants he'd been sleeping in before, and she sighed as he slid his hand across the space towards her.

He lifted his finger, stroked under her shirt to her skin, slow patterns that made her warm. She reached out and cupped his elbow, dragged her palm down his forearm to his wrist. He slid the back of his hand up to her waist, circled around to the dip in her back. The press of his skin to hers was electric and she held off, let the delicious burn arc up her spine.

His eyes were so blue, so textured a color when he wanted her. She stroked the back of his arm, felt his triceps flex as he curled closer to her, their bodies almost touching. She rubbed her thumb over his shoulder, trailed her fingers to his ribs until they joined at his sternum. The slow, heavy thump of his heart picked up; his throat worked as he came for her.

When their mouths met, she sighed into the barely there kiss, the feather-soft brush of his lips to hers. She felt the touch of his fingers at her jaw, to her ear, the way he sifted through her hair and came even closer, dominant and demanding but so very gentle, so heartfelt in everything that it made her hurt.

"Castle," she murmured, breathing in time to his breaths, her lashes catching his and mingling.

"Kate."

She pushed in closer, kissed the line of his jaw so that her lips burned with his stubble, worked her hands under his shirt, wanting more.

"Kate, I lo-"

"I know," she breathed. "I know."

She slid her thigh over his knee, pressed in tightly, her mouth coming back to his with a reverence intended to say the same to him, to speak for her.

And then she couldn't help it; she couldn't hold it back. It all wanted out - what he did for her, to her, what it all meant. "Castle."

He pulled her against his hips, his mouth worshiping at the column of her neck.

"I love you too."

* * *

She had her hand pressed over his mouth as she shook her head, cheeks flaming, eyes not meeting his. "No, I - I didn't - Castle, _God_, I don't know what I'm doing here."

Castle snagged her hand, drew it away from his mouth. "That's okay," he said back, felt it still in his chest, scraping his throat, forever seared into him like a brand - her words. "It's okay, Kate."

"It's not okay," she moaned, and now she was pressing the heels of her hands into her eyes. "Castle. It's - I don't know how to do this or-"

"I'm not sure there's a roadmap for this," he said quietly. "An instruction manual. But we can figure it out - one day at a time."

She shivered, still not looking at him, but at least she wasn't drawing away. Castle let out one small, hesitant breath and circled his fingers around her wrists, pulled her hands down from her face.

She was nearly crying.

"Hey," he said. "It's okay. It's not the end of the world. Believe me. Been there a few times."

She gave a strangled laugh and flopped onto her back, staring up at the ceiling. "I'm not - in a good place, Castle. I haven't been since my mom died. I'm going to - I don't want to hurt you."

He reached out and slid his hand across her stomach, his thumb stroking, not trying to draw her in, only letting his touch claim her. She stuttered to a stop and her head turned to look at him, eyes wide and anguished.

Love shouldn't be so sad.

"Beckett, I think you're forgetting."

She swallowed, shook her head.

"I'm already in love with you," he answered. Because it was the only answer. "I'm already-"

She pressed her fingers to his mouth again, eyes filling up but no tears spilling over. "Castle. I'm not - good at this. I'm bad news."

"I can handle your bad news, Kate Beckett. In fact," he growled. "I might be the one man specially trained to handle your bad news, so bring it on."

She stared at him, and he was done with it. Done with gentleness and prompting and trying to tease her away from the dark edge of destruction. He wouldn't let her slip away; he couldn't.

"Castle-"

"You got this, Kate. You're the strongest person I know. And you're not doing it alone."

* * *

When she'd fallen asleep afterwards, her hair like silk over his arm and her lashes laced along her cheeks, Castle leaned in and breathed a kiss to her temple, slowly eased away.

He opened up the four file folders they'd begun on the New York City murders - her mother, Cavanaugh, Murray, and Stewart. Spreading out the information they'd gathered, he reestablished her beloved timeline, using a seam in the wood of the table as his delineation.

Take Back the Neighborhood initiative - there was perhaps something to that. But he didn't need to know why, he just needed to connect the murders to the hired gun who had done it.

He pulled out his phone and checked his messages. His father had sent him a long list of _all clears_, but nothing more on Albert Green. Castle stood, glancing to Beckett once more, but she was out. He called his father and pushed open the door, snagging the key card from the side table as he went.

He pressed his elbow to the door to keep it from slamming, and then his father picked up.

"Richard."

"Albert Green," Castle started. "I need more intel on him. You sent a dossier, but it's pretty sketchy."

"A cover, most likely."

"Did you get an associated address?" he asked quietly, leaning against the wall inside the hotel.

He heard his father tapping on the keyboard. "Hm. Give me just a. . .ah, no. Albert Green does not, but it looks like another cover - Alfred Brown - owns an apartment across the street."

"I need eyes and ears-"

"I'm on it, Richard."

The line went dead and Castle glanced at his phone - his father had hung up. He'd search the apartment across the street and get back to Castle; Black might be something of a cold bastard, but he did the job.

Castle swiped the key card in the lock and went back inside the room. She'd curled up while he was gone, her face turned towards the door, but she was still asleep. Castle gathered the laptop his father had left for him and sat down beside her, sliding his legs under the covers and close to her warmth.

He opened up the laptop and Kate sighed in her sleep, fingers twitching. Castle leaned over and brushed the back of his hand across her cheek, watched her eyes move behind her lids, deep in dreams.

She'd said she loved him.

They needed to solve this case, put it to rest - once and for all.

* * *

Kate woke slowly, the close heat of a body surrounding her and the disorientation of golden lamp light. She opened her eyes to Richard Castle, the sharp angle of his jaw and the concern in his gaze; his fingers were in her hair, scraping it back from her temple.

"Castle?"

"You up to a road trip? My guys found something."

She captured his hand and pressed it against her cheek, tried to anchor herself in the present - morning or late night, she had no idea. "Road trip. Time's it?"

"Five in the morning. I'd have let you sleep, but I didn't want to leave it too long."

She nodded and swallowed past the socked feeling of her mouth, felt her eyes slipping shut as she gathered herself together. And then the hard push of his kiss against her lips and the jostling of the bed.

She groaned. "I'm up. I'm awake. Road trip. Do I have time to shower?"

"Sorry, no. Later."

Beckett sat upright with effort and slogged out of bed, nearly falling when her knees refused to lock. Castle caught her with a grip at her upper arm, steadied her until she could head for the bathroom.

"Give me five minutes," she muttered and shut the door on him.

* * *

When her teeth were brushed and she felt less like a zombie, Beckett opened the door and stepped out of the bathroom. Castle had his laptop open on the table, but he closed it when she appeared and slid it into her messenger bag. Seemed like he'd appropriated it.

"Where we going?"

"First," he said, stepping into her with the bag slung over his shoulder. "Good morning, Kate."

She opened her mouth to ridicule him for that, but his lips were there instead, his hands at her back chastely, his kiss a welcome.

"M-morning," she stuttered out.

He grinned and stroked his fingers in her hair, brushed another kiss to her jaw, the heat of him like a hand pressed against her skin.

Oh right. She'd said, last night, that. . .she. . .loved him.

"I really said it," she sighed, dropping her forehead to his shoulder. She needed her high heels, gain a little advantage, but all she had were her converse.

"You did," he murmured, something like a laugh in the back of his throat. "And I said it too. Because I do, Kate Beckett. I am."

She shivered and brought her hands up between them, pushed lightly on his shoulders to get enough distance to focus on his face. He was smiling, but a grimness backdropped his eyes.

"Where we going, Castle?"

"Back to your neighborhood. We found the NSA's listening post." He grabbed her by the hand and headed for the door.

It took just that long for the words to sink in. She balked in the hallway. "Listening post?"

He gritted his teeth and nodded.

"They've been - they were _listening_ to us?" she gasped.

His hand squeezed around hers. "For a long time, Kate."

* * *

Beckett surveyed the loft apartment with a sinking heart, scraped a hand through her grimy hair as she tried to take it all in. The wide windows were covered with taped-up newspaper, but one of Castle's team had ripped down a section; through the smudged glass, she could see her own apartment building. Her own apartment, actually, her blinds open to let in the light.

And the unwanted surveillance, apparently as well.

Fuck.

She closed her eyes and ran both hands down her face, tried to erase the image of herself in the shower, of Castle naked in her living room and taunting her to strip as well, and the _hood_-

Oh no. Oh no, no-

"Beckett. Come here."

She lifted her head and found him at the other end of the broad room, hunched over some recording equipment. She didn't want to face it, didn't want to know, but Castle didn't look too worried.

"Yeah," she muttered and made her way over to him.

Audio files were called up on the computer screen - no video - and Castle clicked play. From the tinny speakers, she could hear herself muttering over the names of her mother's fallen co-workers. The ragged inhalations and her stumbling around the table, the clatter of the sharpie when it fell through her fingers, her own broken cursing. A sob that she hadn't been able to hold back.

She'd been alone.

"I sound insane," she muttered, lifting her eyes, suddenly so damn grateful that none of Castle's team had followed them up here. "Fuck, Castle. I sound like a lunatic. How the hell have you put up with me?"

He didn't answer, and that was damning enough. Beckett sank onto the card table behind her, buried her head in her hands, elbows propped up on her knees.

"Looks like they've only kept a week's worth of recordings at any one time. And it's audio only. Which is why the guy came over and took photos of your timeline. Beckett, it's likely this nest has been here for a long time, but they-"

She groaned and lifted her head. "Are you seriously telling me the NSA has been spying on me for. . .years?"

"Yes. They've been keeping track of you, how far you'd gotten. Which means it's someone with resources. Military resources-"

"The killer was - you said a hired killer. Did you mean - someone in the _military_ was hired to kill my mother? And now the Department of Defense is _watching_ me-"

"Beckett. We're getting close. Obviously, we're getting close. They felt the need to blow their cover just so they could get at the information you have."

She pressed a hand to her forehead and glanced through the ragged tear of newspaper towards her building.

"Castle. All those - this audio file. How long does it go?"

She heard him sigh and glanced to him.

"Castle."

"Long enough."

Long enough to hear himself come through the door, drag her away from the case. Long enough to catch his urgent demand that she take a break, relax, do something, _anything, do me, Beckett._ His laughter, the way it flamed in her chest and dropped to her stomach, igniting everything.

"It's on tape."

He grunted and nodded. "But they go nowhere else. All the tapes. I'm deleting them. They won't ever-"

She reached out and stayed his hand, gripping him hard around the wrist, her heart thundering behind her ribs. Kate licked her lips and couldn't believe it when she said it.

"Play through."

"What?"

"I want to hear - hear what they heard. I want to hear. . .us."

He sucked in a breath and stood, his hands coming to her shoulders as if to put her away. She struggled against him, slipped out of his grip, lurched to the computer screen. She scrubbed through the next few minutes until she heard the telltale heat of his voice.

She stopped and let it play.

* * *

Castle couldn't not look at her as the audio played. Couldn't tear his eyes away from the pissed off flush that had risen in her cheeks, the fists of her hands against her thighs, as the audio went on.

He heard his own stupid lines, and amazing, enticing, gorgeous laughter. He heard himself calling her name, too eager for her, too willing to do whatever she wanted. Their skin meeting, the broken way he begged her, _please, Kate, please let me _and then the breathy catch in her voice that even now was doing it for him-

She made a hard noise that brought his eyes up to her face; she was staring back at him, her throat working, the sheen of tears in her eyes even as she listened to herself on the recording. He rocked forward on his heels to the rhythm of that sighing, breathless wonder of Kate Beckett falling apart in his arms, and her tears spilled over in front of him, streaking down her face.

He reached past her to tap the space bar and silence the track, brought his fingertips up to her face but couldn't find a way to touch her.

"Kate."

"You're so beautiful to me," she whispered. "Why are you so good to me?"

Her words caught in him like barbed wire, shredding his chest open, and he framed her eyes with his hands, pulled her mouth into his for a kiss, warm and rich and velvet and needful. So needful.

"Because I love you."


	6. Chapter 6

**Close Encounters 2**

* * *

With Castle at her back, his large body shielding hers in a way she'd never have thought she wanted, Kate went through the computer and deleted every single scrap of surveillance audio. Her mother's killer had heard the most damaged parts of her soul on these tapes, and then used it against her for the last six years, and her fury and indignation was keeping her from being wrecked.

Broken. Because she'd heard herself - heard her own desperation - and it wasn't attractive. Or healthy.

"I promised my father I'd never do this again," she said suddenly, her throat dry.

Castle's hand came to her shoulder in a crushing grip, but it helped to anchor her. "Still haven't met your father," he murmured. "You were touting him pretty highly - normal guy and all that."

"You should meet him," she said inanely, then shook her head. "I promised him, Castle. Shit, we made a deal, and look what I've done. Look what I'm doing."

"You made a deal," he said flatly.

"We saved each other," she got out, her legs like lead in the plastic chair. She stared at the computer screen, but nothing resolved. "He drank - he fell into the bottle and he couldn't see clear of it."

"And you fell into your mother's case," he said quietly, too understanding, too knowing. How had she let this charming, rakish CIA _spy_ get so far into her heart, her psyche, her messed up life?

"I drowned in the case, Dad drowned in alcohol. Addictive personalities, both of us."

He squatted down beside her chair, his palm heavy on her thigh. "Tell me."

"He passed out more often than not. But one night he drove his car off into a ditch just past the cabin - our family's little vacation home. He'd been holed up there, drinking, and he went out for more. He thought he was sober enough - he walked away, head injury, but he got caught in a snow drift. And I didn't even know."

"Where were you?"

"Here. More specifically, sneaking into the Archives at the 12th precinct to photocopy my mother's case file. Which, as you know, is illegal."

"How'd your dad survive?"

"Maybe the alcohol kept him warm? I don't know. A neighbor found him. He had frostbite on his littlest toe - had to be amputated, but he kept all his fingers. Broken capillaries in his cheeks. The hospital called me from his cell phone and I let it go to voicemail. I didn't call back until the next night."

"Kate."

She shivered and twisted in the seat to face him, pushed her knees into his armpits as he startled, his body balanced now by her thighs. The heavy weight of him against her seemed to help; she didn't know why.

"In the hospital, we made a deal. He'd give up the drinking, go to AA, and I'd quit my mother's case, go to therapy again."

"Therapy again," he repeated.

She nodded, lifting her head to look at him, but there was only mild curiosity on his face and a protective hovering that ought to have made her push him off of her, but it only held her to him.

"I went back into therapy, Dad went to AA. Here we are."

"But you're working your mom's case," he said quietly. "Because of me."

She startled, clutching at his arms as they laid heavy over her lap. "No. Not because of you. Just-"

"I pushed it. I was the bastard who came crashing through your life, reopening old wounds, asking questions, and you warned me. God, I wish I had never-"

She clapped her hands at his cheeks, gripping him hard to silence him. "No. You have gotten me further than I had ever thought possible. More answers in the last six weeks, Castle, than - oh God, I needed this. You don't know what it's like - the not knowing."

"But I pushed you right back into your. . .obsession, Kate."

She shook her head. "I was already there. I'd promised him, but Castle - you have to know, surely you realized that I'd been doing this for. . .years now? All my off time has been spent in pursuit of this. I just learned how to hide it from everyone. I know my symptoms: weight loss, insomnia, dehydration."

"Your promise to your father just drove you underground. Is that what you're telling me?"

"I have a routine, Castle. A checklist every night. Shower just in case I haven't yet. Order in Chinese and put a carton at every station of the timeline. Take half a sleeping pill before I even start so I can't stay up too late."

He was squeezing her hands too tightly. "Are you kidding me?"

She shook her head. "I hid it from everyone. But not you."

He sighed. "No. I - saw. Saw what was happening-"

"And you heard that recording," she said insistently, wriggling out of his grip to gesture at the computer screen. She felt him tense at her feet. "You heard how good you are for me, Castle. You don't let me drown."

His hands came up to frame her face again, and then his mouth sipped a kiss, light and redemptive and begging forgiveness all at once.

She stroked her thumbs under his eyes, watched the way all his hard discipline, his bristling strength came at attention for her, for her, because he loved her.

"After all this," she started slowly, casting her eyes around the room. "I have to find this guy, Castle. I need to find him. I need it to be over."

He nodded, and she saw the hesitation, the slight withdrawing. But his words were saying something else.

"We will. We will, Kate. I promised you once before and it still holds true. We will find him. Soon."

"What do you know, Castle?" she asked quietly. "What haven't you told me?"

His shoulders hunched and he cursed under his breath, dropping back onto the floor with a huff. "It's nothing. It's just - it's nothing."

"It's not nothing."

"It's a long shot. I'm still working on a possible. . .long shot."

She braced herself against the edge of the chair, pressed her teeth into her tongue to get herself under control. "I - I understand."

"I don't want to give you false hope or have you chasing after ghosts-"

"I said I understand," she rasped out. She did; she'd seen herself now, in the mirror of this NSA listening post. He was doing it for her own good. "Just. . .when you do know-"

"Of course. You'll know first thing."

Kate nodded, realized that her hands were in fists on her lap, spread her fingers out. She suddenly felt old.

"I'm tired," she got out. "I need - I need to sleep. Castle, I need-"

"We'll go back to the hotel," he murmured. "Let me take you back."

"I have to call in to the 12th-"

"Black already cleared your absence."

And she knew then she was past exhausted, because a move like that would have made her furious forty-eight hours ago.

* * *

Kate woke to Castle's phone vibrating in his hand; he slid out of bed, murmuring an apology to her as he went, and she closed her eyes again. The bed was too soft for her taste, but it was warm with the leftover heat of him and she stretched into it, slid her toes to the edge of the mattress.

She heard him padding back, felt his hand settle on her thigh with a squeeze.

"I've got to go in, Beckett."

She turned her head to see him, but he was already bending down close, a kiss soft on her mouth. "Did you find-"

"It's not about your mom's case. It's work," he sighed.

Kate curled her fingers at his jaw, saw the regret swimming like guilt in his eyes. "Hey. Castle - you do what you need to do."

"I'm supposed to be on leave. But this one - this is important."

She lifted up to her elbows, kissed him with intent, no small amount of pride as well. "Go save the world."

His mouth slipped into a smile over hers; his fingers skimmed up the column of her throat before he rose, moved away.

"I don't know how long this will take," he said. "But you stay put, Beckett."

She watched him go.

* * *

Beckett had just gotten into the bathtub, sinfully hot and swamping her senses, when her phone rang from the bedroom. She groaned and tilted her head back, debating. It wasn't Castle; he'd changed her phone's ringtone for him to 'Secret Agent Man' - hardly subtle - and it wasn't her father's either.

Still, she couldn't let it go. Kate sat up again, water streaming off her body as she yanked a towel from the rack and wrapped up, sprinting on tiptoe to catch the call. When she answered, a little breathless and definitely shivering, there was a long silence on the phone.

It wasn't a number she recognized.

"Hello?"

"I was - I am trying to reach a police detective."

"Yes, ma'am," Beckett said, her confusion evaporating. "That's me. Is this Ms. Dixon?"

"Are you the police detective?"

"Yes, ma'am. Detective Beckett at the NYPD. Thank you for calling me back."

"My man said you were insistent," the woman huffed. "What kind of detective are you? Robbery? Because I never let-"

"No, ma'am. No, I'm with - homicide."

"Oh, dear."

"In the course of an investigation, I ran into your name, Ms. Dixon."

"Oh, my."

Kate pressed her lips together and hesitated at the threshold of the bathroom. All the way in or just give it up and get dressed?

"I'm not trying to alarm you, Ms. Dixon-"

"Althea. Call me Althea. What - who has died?"

"Ah. Well. I was hoping you could help me clear that up."

"I don't know how I can. But anything you need, honey."

"Your family - the Rodgers family. I was wondering what you could tell me about them."

"This isn't about identifying a - a body, is it? This is. . .are you looking at someone in my family for murder?"

"No, ma'am," she said quietly, biting her bottom lip as she moved into the bathroom. Beckett dropped the towel and put one foot into the steaming bath, eased down into the water. "No, I'm sorry. I'm just looking for information."

"On my family."

"I'm not at liberty to disclose the particulars of my investigation-"

"Oh, baloney."

Beckett choked on a laugh, covered the phone with her hand to keep from splashing into the speaker. "Can you tell me about - about your niece?"

"My niece," Ms Dixon said sharply. "You mean Martha. The one we've all edited out of our history."

"Yes." Kate slid deeper into the bath until it was just her head and the tips of her fingers out, closing her eyes. She shouldn't be doing this, not behind the authority of her badge, but it was the distraction she needed. She'd always thrown herself into a mystery when she was battling the clutching fingers of her mother's case - this time it wasn't a murder, and it wasn't a book - it was Castle's family.

"Martha was an actress. From the time she was born, all she did demanded the spotlight. Take that as you may."

"And she. . .ran away."

"At sixteen. I can't say I blamed her. Whatever she did after that - well, I had heard she managed some success on the stage." Ms Dixon said stage like it was actually a polite term for brothel.

"Is she - does she still keep in touch with you? With any of her family?"

"Miss Beckett, _I _don't keep in touch with my family. How am I to know?"

Deflection - answering a question with a question. "Ms Dixon, did she ever try to reach you?" she said quietly.

There was barely a pause, but Kate heard it.

"No."

"No?" she inquired, let her tone betray the fact that she didn't believe the older woman.

"I - she - not really. I was - it's possible she did. Years and years ago. I don't know."

"But she didn't get hold of you?"

"No. My nephew - well. Suffice it to say: no. Martha was a proud and melodramatic girl. I assumed she was in trouble, but. . .I had no way of getting to her."

"In trouble."

"My dear, there actually is family laundry which I am not willing to air."

In trouble as in. . .pregnant? Beckett thought so. "When was this, Ms Dixon?"

"You think she's dead," the older woman said suddenly, a catch in her voice that Kate hadn't expected. "You think she's - have you found a body?"

"No, ma'am. No body. I don't have any reason to believe she's dead."

"It was back around. . .oh, the late 1960s. I can't be more - oh wait, yes. Actually. I know exactly the year. Robert Kennedy was shot at the beginning of that summer. He was shot and we were all - oh what a terrible June. So Martha tried to call in August. August 1968. I didn't think the world could take much more. And yet here we are."

Kate blinked. August 1968 would have been. . .eight months before Castle was born.

"You said she tried to call, Ms Dixon. Did you get a phone number?"

"Oh no. Not a _phone _call. She tried to come by and see me. But I wasn't there."

* * *

Castle stared at the overhead projection screen, his heart beating too fast.

"When did this come in?"

"I called you the moment after we knew what we were looking at," his father answered tersely.

"When did it come in?" he repeated, his eyes roaming the familiar street, the building that had become like a second home. A first home - the first real home he'd ever had.

Beckett's apartment.

"It came in yesterday. Near eleven. Eastman-"

"And we're sure?" he asked, forcing his brain to study the man loitering outside her apartment. Detach and observe. "No one has ever seen Foley."

"We're not one hundred percent, but all the indicators are there." His father clasped his hands behind his back and lifted his chin at the image being projected in the command center. "Son. It's him."

Foley. He counted the man responsible for Colleen's death, even though it had been Castle who-

"He came in through LaGuardia?" Castle asked, interrupting his own thoughts. Colleen was years ago and another lifetime. What mattered was Beckett.

"Yes. Under the name Michael Flynn. He met with the Westies here in the city - one of the NYPD's snitches gave us just enough that we're sure. We're sure."

Damn. On Beckett's street. "This was yesterday morning."

"He followed you there." His father's voice held no judgment, but damn it, Castle was condemning himself.

"He did," he gave over, hands tightening into fists. "He must have. I was so preoccuppied with that damn NSA tail-"

"Which led to real intelligence," his father interrupted lightly. "And Foley is a ghost. We all know that." _Colleen was a casualty of war; she knew the risks._

Right, but what his father was also so carefully not saying was that Black would've known Foley was following him, sensed it had it been him. He'd always been able to do that. And if Castle had been up on his training, steeped in his discipline like his father had warned him he ought to be, then Castle would've known as well.

Instead, he'd led Foley straight to Castle's only weakness.

Detective Beckett.

* * *

Kate went over the timeline in her head, her neck tilted back against the tub, her body unwinding in the bath.

She'd been assuming that his mother had been using her maiden name as her stage name as well - Martha Rodgers. But it was entirely possible that Martha had gotten married and used that name instead. In fact, Martha could be one of the rather well known Broadway actresses, and Beckett wouldn't even know.

She had a photo she'd culled from the Montauk Press - a sixteen year old Martha Rodgers at a coming out party, white dress and gloves - but the image was in black and white and only showed her profile. From the Playbill archives, Beckett had garnered a professional shot from 1966; while it was better, it was still old.

Martha Rodgers had to be in her sixties by now, and her hair color and shape would be vastly different. She could be anyone.

The water sloshed against her neck and she opened her eyes to the strange sensation. The room was bright with the overhead light, the bathtub tucked into one corner past the massive shower. She tilted her head and glanced to the door, but it was open and she had a clear view into the bedroom.

Huh. Nothing.

It had to be last night's excursion to the NSA's listening post, hearing those recordings. She felt eyes crawling all over her now.

She was being paranoid.

Still she reached out for her phone and wrapped her fingers around it, checked the screen for messages.

Nothing.

It'd only been three hours though.

* * *

The timeline was laid out on the coffee table, but Beckett ignored it. Or, well, she was doing a rather decent job of ignoring it. Close to ignoring it. The brightly colored index cards were demanding.

Five hours. She ordered in brunch even though it was nearly two in the afternoon, and she ate lazily in front of his laptop, scrolling through _Variety_ archives for Martha Rodgers. There might be a wedding announcement if she married a patron of the arts, and somehow, after speaking with Althea, Beckett had the sense that Martha would manage it, that Martha might actually have figured out how to do very well for herself.

But _Variety_ gave her nothing. In fact, it was difficult to find the Broadway productions.

Beckett rolled the cart back outside the room with the laptop propped on one hip, came back inside still trying to think.

And not about her mother's case. For once.

Martha Rodgers. Where had she gone? Beckett needed to think like a new mother with a baby she couldn't provide for, a job that demanded all her time, and a passion for theatre that overrode her common sense.

Well, put like that, Beckett and Martha Rodgers had quite a lot in common. She didn't have an unlooked-for baby, but she had this thing with Castle - whatever it was, however it might play out - and she still didn't know how to reconcile this with her job, her passion for her mother's justice.

Martha's choice had been to drop her son at boarding school and never return.

What was Beckett's choice?

Castle had told her to stay here; do nothing.

It'd been five hours.

* * *

"Esposito, I need your help on something off-book."

"I am all ears."

Beckett grinned and stood to one side of the window, studying the street below the hotel. "I've been taken into protective custody-"

"Then should you be calling me?"

"Not technically. But it's driving me crazy. I need to work on something to distract myself."

"I got a fresh body. You wanna make cold calls while you hide away?"

Kate wrinkled her nose, watching the stationary vehicle just below her. Probably Castle's team. She hoped. "No. Not that desperate. I was wondering if you could get me some archive information."

"On a cold case?"

"Not a homicide," she answered. "Just records. I did a search myself a few weeks back, but I don't think I was looking for the right thing."

"Dumping more work on me, Beckett, while you live the high life?"

"Don't you know it." The vehicle was a Kia. Huh. What had he said about-

"Fine," Espo sighed loudly. "You owe me."

She laughed and shifted away from the window. "Don't I know it."

* * *

Beckett was getting into trouble.

His computer was a repository of CIA databases and special features. She was able to get online, but it wasn't a browser she'd ever seen before, and it didn't function the way she expected it to. When she'd been looking at _Variety_ a few hours ago, messages and alerts kept popping up that she didn't think wise to turn off.

He had another one now:

_Search results returned._

What was that about? His mysterious business he'd left for this morning, only - oh, well, nine hours ago now.

Search results.

Beckett shrugged it off and shut down the browser, closed the lid of the laptop, and plugged it back into the charger. She unfolded her legs from the queen-sized bed and stood up, stalking across the room towards the open door of the master bath.

What search results?

* * *

Beckett paced the room, shoved her hands through her hair, and avoided the coffee table. But if her stride happened to take her past-

No.

Sh pivoted and went for her bag, digging through until she found her sneakers and could pull them out. She peeled her jeans off, snagged a pair of leggings she normally would wear to bed, and tugged them on. Socks were a little harder to find, but once she was dressed, she turned quickly and snagged the key card from the counter by the microwave.

She needed a run.

Richard Castle had been gone for twelve hours, and she hadn't heard a word.

* * *

The gym was crowded with late-in-the-day businessmen, flight attendants on leave, and random strangers she couldn't pinpoint. She had spotted her shadow - one of Castle's guys - inconspicuous in his suit and with his arms crossed, but she hadn't cared.

She ran.

She ran.

She ran.

The treadmill pounded hard against the soles of her shoes, jolting pain into her knees, cracking her hips, and jarring her head. She came back to herself when the sweat blinded her and the thud began to pulse in her own blood.

She blinked hard and looked down at the display, couldn't make sense of the numbers or the route. It wasn't possible that she'd been running for three hours. Was it?

Castle had been gone fifteen hours?

Beckett hopped off the treadmill, clutching the bars when her knees went out and dropped her. She smacked her hand against the stop button, gave a few tentative steps around the machine until she got her balance back.

She went straight for the CIA monkey in the suit. His eyes didn't leave her, his face a grim mask.

"Where's Castle?" she said quietly.

* * *

"Foley's gone," Eastman shouted. "Around the back - go, go, go!"

Agent Castle checked his stride and turned towards the front door of the bar, drawing his weapon as he did so and knowing Eastman would have his back. Their joint task force with the FBI was falling apart rapidly, but Castle wasn't going to let that get in the way.

Hitting the street, Castle raced for the alley that lead to the back door, saw the leather coated figure just ahead of him.

"Stop!" he yelled, knowing it was futile. He felt Eastman come up at his six, and he put on another burst of speed, his legs burning, as he watched their guy go over a metal divider at the back of the alley.

The FBI agent assigned to them - Crowley - joined Castle at the fence, both of them taking it in a leap that rattled Castle to his bones. He grunted in frustration as the fence shook under their disjointed movements, but he vaulted himself over and onto the sidewalk below, felt the ragged twist of his fingers that meant a sprain.

He took a moment to gather some recon, hunched in a defensive posture, breath steaming in the cold night air.

This was Westies territory, and judging by the looks on the people out today, they wouldn't be helping him.

Castle drew his weapon again and headed cautiously for this alley's entrance, noting the laundromat's sweet-scented exhaust vents on one side and the reek of the dumpster on the other. Chinese place. He heard Eastman's grunt as he dropped to the ground behind him.

"Crowley?" he called back softly.

"Here."

"Cover me."

"Got it."

They took the mouth of the alley simultaneously, head checking around the corner and clearing the street.

"Anything?" Castle called.

"Nada."

"Me either." Absolutely still. The rush hour foot traffic was heavy but their guy had slipped in somehow, made himself invisible. A ghost.

"Foley got away," Eastman said, approaching them with a limp in his gait. "Didn't he? He got away. Damn it."

"He made you in the bar," Crowley growled at him.

Eastman shook his head in disgust and holstered his weapon. "He's gonna go to ground."

Castle still scanned the street, unwilling to give up when they were this close to catching Foley. Surely a break in the crowd, a man looking back over his shoulder-

"There he is," Castle said urgently, jerking forward. "There he is. Ten o'clock, just crossing the street."

Eastman turned back, pressing a finger to his earbud and speaking into the mic at his lapel. "Echo-Five needs eyes on East 237th, heading for Katonah Avenue. Suspect is on foot, just past O'Grady Plumbing."

Castle took off before Eastman even finished.


	7. Chapter 7

**Close Encounters 2**

* * *

Mr. Spy Bodyguard nodded towards the door of the hotel room and Beckett sighed, pulled the key card out, and opened it up. She gritted her teeth, casting the agent one last backward glance, but he was resolute. He wasn't going to tell her anything.

Castle was _on a mission_.

For sixteen hours.

Fine.

Beckett slammed the door on So Very Unhelpful and ripped the ponytail out of her hair, stalked towards the bathroom. The shower came on with force, and she got her fingers under her shirt, pulled it off over her head and swiped at her face with it.

She swallowed hard and toed off her shoes, yanked at her socks until they peeled off. Leggings tangled, but she gave up and sat on the floor, wrestled them down. Her eyes burned with sweat; she was trying not to think.

Sixteen hours and nothing. No call. No message. Just _stay put, Beckett._

Kate paused, steam already pouring around her, but she hopped up and ran back for the bedroom, snatched the laptop off the bed.

When she opened it up, fifteen more alerts and messages had popped up on the screen. At the top was _Search results returned_ and so she clicked on it.

An error message warned her that she didn't have network access from a remote location to allow her entry to the query. After that was a complicated string of code that Castle had apparently written and buried inside it were the words _Special Forces_.

It jumped out at her.

She closed the window, her heart pounding, and then scanned through the rest of the alerts.

There was something here, but first she needed to shower, give herself time to think it through. Be smart. Then she could pour over his laptop, figure out what the hell was going on.

* * *

He eased his battered body into his desk chair and took a moment to just sit there, breathe shallowly through ribs that weren't broken, so their doc said. His face throbbed. He wanted to go home.

But she still wasn't safe. He'd taken care of Foley, but there was still the NSA on her. Still her mother's case. He had a terrible feeling that when they knew who had ordered the hit on her mother, the reason for the NSA's presence would be crystal clear.

He opened his eyes - eye - and called up his email program, just to check. It'd been a couple days since he'd run Beckett's search and this was a good opportunity to see what was happening.

The search results were back. Castle opened his portal to the CIA network and input the dates he knew from the murders and the squads his search had yielded.

He hunched into the computer as it returned his result.

One man.

He had a name.

And he knew the damn son of a bitch.

* * *

Beckett bounced on her toes as she finger-combed her damp hair into a ponytail. Her own image looked strange, her hair flat, and she took it down again. Her toes curled on the bathroom's linoleum and she scraped her hair half back, liked that better.

She headed into the bedroom and found clean socks, tugged them on as she surveyed the already lived-in looking hotel room. Castle had arranged her index cards out on the coffee table in front of the television; she drifted to it and stood before the couch, wavering.

He wasn't here. Who knew how long?

She saw her own hand reaching for the index cards and she couldn't even stop herself.

The electronic lock whirred and the door banged open.

Kate turned with a grunt of surprise, but Castle was coming into the room, his tie loose around his neck, his jacket missing, a hole ripped into the knee of his dress pants. And his face.

"Castle. What happened?"

He shook his head and winced, dropped down onto the couch. His right lid was puffy and blue, purple fireworked from the edges of his cheek, and a deep black circled his eye.

"Someone punch you?" she said quietly, grabbing the ice bucket and dumping the plastic cups out of it.

"Someone. Yeah."

"Be right back," she muttered, grabbing a key card as she left.

Beckett got to the vending machines and nudged the lip of the bucket against the automatic ice machine, her thoughts churning as the chunks fell slowly. Whatever official business he'd done this morning had been resolved, or so it seemed.

But her mother's case? Had he even-

Kate closed her eyes and took a deep breath, steadied the bucket as it filled. She opened her eyes and moved away, heading back down the hall with the ice propped up on her hip. She passed the key card through the lock, but Castle was already up and opening it.

"Hey," he said, sounding a little dazed.

She pushed to move him back to the couch and set the bucket on the coffee table, deliberately on top of the mess of her mother's case.

"Sit down, Castle."

He obeyed without another word, his own fingers coming up to touch his bruised face. She batted his hand away and went to snag a clean washcloth from the bathroom, came back to find him poking at it again.

"Stop that," she sighed, hooking her fingers in his and drawing him away. "Let me put some ice on it."

He sat patiently for her while she filled the cloth with ice, but the moment she pressed it gently to his cheek, he groaned and leaned back. She went with him, put a knee onto the couch to balance as she held the ice to his face.

His hand came up at the back of her thigh, squeezed.

"What can you tell me?" she murmured.

"Nothing."

"Hm." Kate cradled the uninjured side of his face and leaned in, brushing her lips at the yellowed ridge of his nose. Bruised there too. "What _will _you tell me?"

"We got him."

She smiled at that, but she knew he'd tell her the story. Tonight, most likely, when she draped herself over him, he'd whisper his secrets into her neck like he was in confession.

"I'm glad," she said quietly.

"You're safe," he sighed, and his eyes closed. "From him at least."

She. . .was safe?

"Castle?"

"I might have something - I don't know what. There was something on my computer when I left. I don't know, Beckett. I can't - I need to sleep."

"You might have a concussion," she said, her voice low as her throat closed up. He'd thought she was asking about her mother's case. And to her shame, hadn't that been exactly what she was thinking about when she'd gone to get ice?

"No concussion. Doc checked me out. I just - I feel like shit."

She put her other knee onto the couch next to his hip, kept her balance by touching his shoulder, propping herself up over him. His hands came to her thighs, squeezing tightly, and she cradled his face with the ice. He didn't need to be doing this for her; she'd fought her own battles for so long now. And look at him. He needed to rest. He needed to not worry about her so much.

"You found something, Castle?" she whispered. "Your computer said-"

He groaned.

Beckett slowly eased down onto his lap, felt his hands clench harder, the lift of his hips almost unconsciously into hers.

"Castle," she murmured. "What did it say?"

"Might have a possible name for you. But later, later, Kate. My ribs are killing me. I can't-"

"No, I know," she said quietly, and slipped her hand down from his shoulder, a trail down his chest to his belt. "Let me take care of you."

And then he'd tell her. She knew he would.

He always told her his secrets.

* * *

Castle slept.

He'd nearly passed out afterwards, had made a fumbling attempt to return the favor, but Kate had only gotten him to his feet and tucked him into bed. He'd curled his arms around her waist and put his uninjured cheek to her thigh, and she'd stayed.

He slept.

Kate stroked the edges of his battered face, her body tense with a restless arousal and a need to be _doing _something. Meeting this thing head on, battling back. She didn't know if this guy who'd punched Castle was related to her mother's case, but she bet it was. He'd specifically said it was to keep her safe.

He knew she needed to do this - he knew how bad it was when she ran up against the wall around her mother's murder, when all she could do was twist on the hook of its terrible unknowns. She needed answers and he-

Well, she shouldn't be doing this to him. Not now. It was her turn to step up, do her job.

She'd heard herself on those recordings, how dark she'd gotten, how broken in her own-

She needed this over, and she needed it done tonight. Not tomorrow, not later, and not with Castle watching her like a hawk for one wrong move.

Which is why, when she was sure he slept, she touched her lips lightly to his bruised face and eased him off of her. Slowly, so slowly, because he was always so ready for battle, at attention. He stirred once and his fingers snagged in her belt loop, but she gently untangled him.

When she was free, she moved to the coffee table where the melting ice was still in the bucket, and below that - his CIA key fob she'd swiped from his pocket. While she was-

He hadn't noticed.

She pushed the little device into her bag and grabbed her jacket, her gun and badge and keys, and because she couldn't help it, the blue note card from the timeline, the one with her mother's name and date of death on it. She shoved it all down into the bag and eased it over her shoulder.

Castle had a name.

* * *

Castle woke violently when his phone went off, jerked out of bed instantly aware of the solitude of the room. He snatched it from the coffee table - he didn't remember taking it out of his pants' pocket, but maybe Kate had put it there - the call was from his office.

"This is Castle."

"Agent Castle, this is Agent Deleware."

Of course it was. "Del, what's up?"

"Ah, sir, Agent Black gave me strict instructions not to involve you, but as you broke protocol, I needed-"

"Wait. What?"

Castle sat down hard on the couch, his eyes traveling over the empty room. Her jacket was gone. Her weapon wasn't on the bedside table.

"Agent Black called me twenty minutes before he boarded that plane with the prisoner Foley; he wanted to know why your girlfriend had slipped her handler."

"She did what?"

"She left the hotel and brushed off Jackson like she was a pro. Black had me do a quiet search, but we got nothing-"

"You're talking about Beckett?" he said, rubbing at his jaw.

"Agent Black is now flying to an undisclosed location with Foley and I couldn't inform him, but then, ah, sir. She. . ."

"Who? What are you saying, Del. Spit it out."

"Your girlfriend showed up here. She has your key fob and the access code and I started to get worried that something had happened to you-"

"Nothing's hap-" He closed his eyes and pressed his fingertips into his forehead, his face throbbing with every painful jolt of his heart. "Looks like we're in for blue skies, sunshine in the forecast."

"Aye, sir. Sunshine in the forecast. Thank you. Thank you, sir, I-"

"Is she still there?"

"Oh. Um."

"My - _girlfriend_," he growled, felt it choking his throat. "She there?"

"Yes, sir. Just now leaving your office."

"Fuck."

"Should I detain-"

"No." He stood up and pushed his hand into his pants' pocket, felt the emptiness. "No, don't. I know where she's going."

Damn it. He wanted to do this _with_ her.

But she'd fucked him and stolen his key fob, much like every other woman he'd love - Colleen, Sophia, and now-

Beckett had finally broken. He'd even seen it coming, but had thought, had hoped, she was stronger, that _they_ were stronger.

But what else explained it? She'd broken and she was going after her mother's assassin.

She was going to kill Dick Coonan.

* * *

Her hands were shaking and she couldn't get the image of his battered face out of her mind.

She'd been equally smacked around on their last case together; it wasn't like they both didn't know it came with the territory. But there was something about the sigh of his body into hers, the whispered _You're safe_ as he'd held on to her. . .

She couldn't shake it. She needed a clear head, but her body was jangled with the aftershocks of their last few days. The last month or so, really. He'd reshaped her life seemingly without effort, and she'd adapted so easily; she'd taken him into herself and now she didn't know how to be without.

He'd had only one name on his search results. She knew his passwords, of course she did; he never could hold back once she brought him close. He spilled everything, and not because she asked for it, but because she-

loved him.

The weight of his key fob was heavy against her thigh, her weapon in its holster nearly dragging her down. She swayed as the subway went around a curve in the tunnel, and she tried to clamp down on the roll of her stomach.

It had to be over. She just had to finish this.

Dick Coonan.

She was going to find out what happened the night her mother was murdered. One way or another.

* * *

While he waited for Beckett to show up at Coonan's home, Castle left a message with his domineering, controlling father because he didn't know what else to do. He didn't know where she was. Deleware would report to Black, dutifully, and when his father's plane touched down in their remote holding facility somewhere near Dubai, he'd get the unwelcome news that Kate Beckett had waltzed right into the CIA's New York secure location.

With his own son's key fob and access codes. And then had disappeared.

Castle would answer for that later, but right now, he needed to find Kate.

He knew she - he had known for a while now what this case was doing to her. And even when she'd brokenly told him about her promise to her father, likening her obsession to alcoholism, he still thought he could make her better, thought the force of his love could keep here there.

He'd been kidding himself.

She was going to ruin her life over something so. . .Coonan wasn't even the guy in charge, Coonan was a tool. And Castle knew he could get real answers out of Coonan if she would just let him-

But she couldn't see that, could she? Or wouldn't. Her life had been so mangled by her mother's murder that it was no wonder she couldn't let it go, not even for a night.

Not even for him.

He had to get to her before she got to Coonan. He needed to find her first.

Castle put in a call to one of his guys.

* * *

She stepped off the subway and onto the platform, the push of people around her helping to clear her head. Beckett shoved her hands into the pockets of her jacket, made sure to keep her arm pinned at her side, her gun secure.

She had slipped the CIA security dogs stationed at the hotel, but that didn't mean she was clean. The NSA had bugged her apartment for years; she didn't delude herself into thinking she was off their radar now.

Beckett took the north escalators and ignored the signs for the street above, wandered through the crowd looking for faces she'd seen one too many times or shadows just at the edge of her vision.

She checked the time and went to a kiosk, paid for a new card with cash, swiped it at the terminal, and went back down below.

Beckett jumped onto the first line running out, dashing to make it before the doors closed, and she was about ninety percent certain that the man in the brown leather jacket had been trying to follow.

She sank into a seat near the doors and planned her next move.

* * *

"Credit cards are silent," Ramirez said.

Castle reached up to scrub his hand down his face, yelped when he touched his bruised eye.

"You okay there, little buddy?"

"Shut up," he growled over the phone. "Anything else?"

"Naw. But if she's headed for your guy, then she's being careful. That bodes well."

Maybe. Maybe not.

"Thanks, let me know if you hear anything."

He ended the call and paced the sidewalk in front of Coonan's office building. She hadn't made a stupid, mad dash straight for Dick Coonan's expensive home nor his elegant offices, and yeah, he was perversely proud of her for that, for having the wherewithal to plan ahead-

Plan ahead. Esposito. Right? Her team.

He called the 12th.

* * *

Beckett pushed open the door to the lobby, slid cautiously inside the building. Her pulse was throbbing in her hands, her thighs; she wanted to run, but she had to be smart about this.

She needed to be smart. She needed to plan. She had to do this _right_ or she'd be-

She had to end this.

Beckett was glad now that she wasn't wearing those heels, glad for the soft tread of her chucks as she opted for the stairs. She had to be careful; she was being watched, but she thought she'd dodged them. Her phone was turned off; she'd popped out the battery to keep them from tracking her using GPS. She hadn't used a single credit card, hadn't gone near her apartment.

This was all that was left.

She had promised her father - her own father - and she hadn't been able to keep that promise. Just because she had Castle, just because she wanted him, loved him, didn't mean she could stop this.

A hired killer meant someone else was behind it - another layer to the mystery, another question she didn't have answers for. It was time to-

A creak above her on the stairs made her freeze, her heart hammering. If someone was there-

She breathed slowly, strained her ears for it. But there was nothing.

Beckett crept slowly up the stairs once more, headed for the top floor.

* * *

Castle raced up the stairs, heedless of his own safety, his heart pounding.

Esposito couldn't be right. Could he? Surely not. The detective had said he hadn't heard from his boss, but his reasoning made sense. It made scary, terrible sense. Esposito knew how she operated: she holed up, she went to ground, she gathered her forces and then she struck when no one saw her coming.

But for her to come here. He couldn't fathom-

Only, Esposito was right. Beckett knew Castle had practically an arsenal of unregistered weapons and equipment at his place, and she knew how to get in and out undetected - he'd shown her that himself. She'd want a phone that no one could trace; she probably needed to get on his clean laptop and do recon on Coonan's address.

But she hadn't been at Coonan's home, nor at his offices. He'd expected her to go straight for the man at his heart, deliver the death blow swiftly. But according to Detective Esposito - someone who worked with her - Castle was wrong.

She planned, Esposito had promised him. She planned it out meticulously. She was a control freak. She'd need a safe place to do that.

So when he got to his floor - that mysterious 'neighbor' she'd encountered once nowhere in sight - he almost couldn't believe it.

Kate Beckett was just coming out of his door, battle ready and hard.

But she froze when she saw him, and it gave Castle just enough of an edge to barrel into her, driving her back over the threshold.

* * *

His tackle knocked the breath out of her and Beckett struggled to remain standing even as every gasp sucked down nothing. Castle rammed his shoulder to her stomach and lifted her into a fireman's carry; her stunned diaphragm refused to work.

She didn't even have a moment to fight back; her head spun, her chest ached, and Castle was frisking her as he went, wrenching her bag out of her hand. The Glock was carefully placed on the kitchen counter as he passed, and she finally sobbed in a breath.

"Castle-"

"You shut the hell up," he growled.

That did it.

Beckett kneed him in the solar plexus before rolling off his shoulder. Castle came at her immediately, a crushing grip to her elbow that sent her to her knees, and then he was pinching the back of her neck until she saw black.

"No," she gasped, still breathless, but trying to rise. He dug in harder and her legs tingled sharply, but she put a heel to the floor and shoved upwards, her fist aiming for his throat.

Or so she thought. Her punch went wide - _of course it did, you love him_ - and he was trapping her arm under his and bodily slinging her down the hallway. Beckett thudded hard against the doorframe to his bedroom, but got to her unsteady feet and gritted her teeth, braced herself as he came for her again.

She lashed out with a kick to his knee that hit him in the calf instead, wounding but not maiming, and he retaliated with the heel of his hand thrust brutally against her chest. She was stunned by it, breath popping out of her mouth and gone.

"I'm sorry; I'm sorry," he was chanting, and then he wrapped his fingers at her neck and squeezed. "I'm so sorry."

Beckett clawed at his hands but it was no use.

She dropped into darkness.


	8. Chapter 8

**Close Encounters**

* * *

Castle caught her before she could fall to the floor, cradling her body against his, his breathing jerky and torn from his chest.

He pressed his fingers to her neck and felt for a pulse, found it throbbing and vivid. He let out a sigh of relief, his forehead bowing to touch hers, breathe her in. And when he'd had a moment, he gathered her up at her shoulders and knees, carried her into his bedroom.

He couldn't let her ruin her life. She'd taken his Glock; he'd seen that fierce, desperate anger in her eyes, the need. She couldn't confront Coonan - he knew that outcome and he wasn't sure he could save her.

Castle laid her gently on his bed, stroked the messy hair back from her face. She already had reddened finger marks on her neck and chest - marks from his fingers. He flexed his hand and made a fist, turned away to search through his closet for what he needed.

He'd have to do this himself. Now. He'd started it - it was his arrogant, asshole of a super spy self who had insisted on opening this up again, breaking her in the process.

He was the one who had to finish it. He would get her the answers she needed from Coonan's office. It was late; Castle had seen him at home not an hour ago. He'd do a thorough, professional search, and then come back when she'd had time to sleep, cool down.

He hoped.

The handcuffs would hurt, but the silk ties were no good - she'd be out of them in moments. With her own set of cuffs, that gave him two pairs to work with.

His throat was raw as he snapped the bracelets around her wrists. "Not nearly as fun as last week," he murmured, threading one of his neckties through the metal, hoping to cushion it against her skin.

She was breathing a little easier now, her lashes fluttering every once in a while as her body struggled to come around. He cuffed one of her hands to the headboard, stroked his fingers down the pale arch of her forearm to the soft inside skin. She shivered and stirred, but didn't wake.

Castle cuffed the other wrist over her head as well, cradled her elbow as he laid her arm against the sheet. Her face was turned away from him on the pillow and he reached out once more to stroke the hair back, his chest so tight he wasn't sure oxygen was making it in.

She was beautiful, and amazing, and ferocious, and non-stop. And he loved the way she brought everything with her into their bed - passionate and intense or quiet and worshipful, depending on her mood. She'd unmade him, remade him, made him hope again.

He cleared his throat and leaned over her, brushed a kiss to her cheek. "I hate you for this, Beckett."

She'd hate him too. He'd accused her once of trying to sabotage their relationship, but he'd been mostly kidding.

It wasn't funny anymore.

* * *

She woke sore, her body cushioned by the firm lines of his mattress, her cheek pressed into his pillow. She could smell him all over her, the musk and sweat of him, and she hummed in approval. Good kind of sore.

Her sound sparked movement and she heard him just beside the bed, smiled as she opened her eyes.

Oh no.

This was very wrong.

She jerked and gasped as handcuffs yanked back, trapping her to his bed, her arms over her head. Castle was strapping a gun into his shoulder holster, his dark long-sleeved shirt pushed up his forearms, his feet in heavy black boots, both irresistible and darkly forbidding at the same time.

"Castle," she croaked but he continued to watch her, only watch her, his eyes removed from her even as they studied. "Castle. What are you doing."

He turned back to his closet and pulled a bag off the top shelf, put it at his feet. She saw the flash of his ankle holster and her mouth went dry.

"Castle, please. Please, don't."

He still refused to speak, reached inside his closet for his black commando jacket, pulled it on as he stuffed things into his pockets. She tugged on the cuffs experimentally - so not like last time, the bastard - and he turned his head and spoke.

"I wouldn't do that."

"Castle. Please."

He shrugged on a backpack and turned towards her, and she strained for him, drew her knees up as if that could give her enough leverage to reach him.

"He killed my mother," she begged, hearing the broken sob in her own voice.

"I know, love. I know he did." Castle reached out and stroked her cheek; she leaned her face into his palm, her eyes sliding shut. He felt so good; she couldn't believe he was doing this. "I'm going to Coonan's office. I'll get the answers you need, Kate."

"No," she gasped, startling towards him only to be jerked back by the links of the cuffs. "No, please. Castle, please don't leave me here. Just let me go. Just let me go with you-"

"I can't let you do that," he ground out, his eyes averted. "I started this - I'll finish it."

"Just let me go," she whispered, hooking a leg around his thigh and tugging. "Just uncuff me and let me-"

"No. I can't trust you with me on this." He was bending down to carefully extract himself from her grip. She tightened her legs and held on, but he stroked his thumbs hard down her thighs and squeezed, some kind of pressure point that made her nerveless, her knees falling away. He turned his back on her.

"Castle," she gasped, not above pleading. For her life. For her very life. "I love you. Please don't do this."

He was walking away like he hadn't heard, like it was nothing. She growled and wrenched against her bonds, the necktie unravelling as she pulled, metal cutting into her wrists. He was nearly down the hall.

"Castle, don't. _Please_. He killed my mother!"

But his back was already disappearing out the door.

She growled and closed her eyes to the desperate emptiness of his apartment.

* * *

Castle left a message with his father, which he knew Black wouldn't receive until it was too late - to help or to hinder. But at least, if something went wrong, he'd send someone to his son's apartment and let Beckett go.

He'd been tempted to let her come with him, tempted to believe that he could restrain her if it came to it, but he wasn't certain he could. And he was determined to get answers - no matter what it took. If he turned up nothing at Coonan's office, he'd go to the man's home.

Have a little talk.

He had methods. He had ways.

And they were all extremely illegal for a CIA operative to perform on native soil. He could be tried for treason.

Coonan was an ex-Special Forces man, a pillar of the community with a long list of charitable donations-

And also her mother's killer.

He couldn't call in his team on this one, couldn't expose them to such a terrible breach of ethics and morality and _law_. He toyed with the idea of asking one of her team - her boys - but he didn't trust them like he trusted Beckett; he couldn't be sure of them when it came to it.

Because he would have a name.

Any means necessary.

* * *

Kate ruthlessly shoved down her panic and angled her feet against her bag, worked her toes through the strap. She was going to throw up and she didn't know if that was because of the body blow or watching him walk out on her, but it took a supreme effort of will to keep it in check.

She jerked the bag towards the bed, let out a shaky breath, and then slowly lifted it to the mattress, her body trembling with concentration.

He'd left her bag here. Was that on purpose?

Beckett felt it catch on something at the edge of the bed, her stomach muscles groaning with the effort, and she cramped her toes to keep a grip on the strap. She swung the bag out a little from the bed frame, then slung it up onto the mattress. It landed next to her knee and she sank back against the pillows in relief, gasping for breath as she stared at his ceiling.

She was going to murder him.

Beckett twisted upright again, used her knee to pull the bag close enough to get it in her teeth, then dragged it towards her right hand. She gripped it weakly with her fingers curled over the cuff and slowly pulled the zipper down with her teeth, her lips catching in the metal and making her grunt in frustration.

It took a few tries, the right angle, the twist of her cuffed wrist as far from the headboard as she could get. And then she had it.

When the bag was opened, she fished inside for her badge, her heart thundering. She'd told him this, hadn't she? Last week when it had been his turn, and all he made it through was cuffing one of her wrists above her head before devouring her with his mouth-

Shit, focus, Beckett. Richard Castle fucking handcuffed you to his bed and tromped off all Terminator style towards _your_ mother's killer. Focus.

Had she told him? She'd told him so much; he'd told _her_ so much. But had this escaped his memory?

Rooting around like bobbing for apples in her bag, she managed to get her teeth on her badge and bring it up. She carefully nudged it to her right hand until she could work her fingers down into the pocket behind her shield. Her hand was throbbing in the cuffs, shaking with the pulse of her blood, and she felt sweat burning her eyes. She dug into the pocket, feeling carefully, her jaw cramping in this awkward position until-

she had it.

Her key. Her handcuffs key by the tips of her fingers. Oh, thank you, God.

Kate drew it out, dropped her badge back to the bed and bit the key with her teeth.

Now to unlock her cuffs.

* * *

Kate Beckett was going to _kill_ him. She growled around the handcuff key and twisted her neck again, hoping this time it would have enough torque to-

She felt the cuffs pop open and gasped, drawing her arm towards her chest, free. Free. She was-

Other wrist. Okay. She could do this.

Beckett scrambled through the mussed bed covers for the key, snagged it from the sheets, and turned to her other hand.

These weren't police-issue handcuffs. These were different. Her key might not work. She had no time to second-guess; he was on his way to Coonan's office, _alone_, and the bastard was doing this without her.

She shoved the key into the lock and it popped free.

Easy.

Kate laughed and untangled her wrist from the hooked mouth of the bracelet, rubbed at her raw skin. She hissed in a breath and brushed her fingers along her chest - bruised. Hurt every time she took a deep breath.

She hurriedly yanked her socks and shoes back on, raced through the apartment to find her jacket, grab her bag once more. Gun. He'd taken the Glock, but there had to be something else she could use here.

She didn't know what Castle had planned, but he said he was heading towards Coonan's office. She wasn't sure what he hoped to find there; it was a longshot, really. Hadn't he done any real detective work? A man like Coonan wasn't going to leave evidence lying around.

She'd planned on the element of surprise, leading him into a interrogation before he knew what she was about. She had a method and it _worked_, and Castle was going screw it all up with his secret agent shit.

Oh, God.

Wait. Was he really going to Coonan's office? Or had he been trying for a little misdirect? Keep her in the dark for as long as possible?

He said he was going to get her answers. He'd confessed to her, late one night when she'd cradled his cheek and kissed him, loved him before she knew she was loving him - he'd confessed to doing whatever it took in the field. He hadn't said it outright, but she'd known his soul was dark with things he didn't want to remember.

Would he torture Coonan?

She found the bag in his closet, the one he'd pulled stuff from to fill his pockets, and she rifled through the contents until she realized what she was looking at.

Vials of drugs, needles, tubing-

He would.

He really would.

Going to see Coonan with _equipment_. _. ._

Castle.

Oh, love, what are you doing?

* * *

Beckett knew exactly where Coonan's office was located, and she had intended on arriving there obliquely to shake off any unwanted guests. But she didn't have the time for the cloak and dagger stuff; she had to get there fast and eliminate the possibility.

If he really was just going to Coonan's office, then it would be okay. They'd be okay.

Well, other than tackling her in his apartment and handcuffing her to the bed-

Shit. He'd snapped, hadn't he? Her mother's case, her own obsessive need - she'd broken him too, broken _them_ and hadn't she been afraid of that all along? She was too much, she demanded too much-

But if he really was at Coonan's office, then at least. . .at least they had a chance.

When she got to the street outside his building, she took the back way through the park, unable to stop her hands from shaking. The wind picked up her hair and dashed it into her face; she tasted sweat and scraped it out of her eyes, nostrils flaring to get a deeper breath.

Her ribs ached but she didn't want to risk going out to the street and hailing a cab. Not yet. She needed to put some distance between herself and his building. She didn't know where the NSA fell on this, if they were working for whoever hired Coonan, but she was betting that Castle was being careful.

He'd be thinking he had time to spare. She'd seen him these last few months - his training and his discipline were going to work in her favor. But she'd go straight for Coonan's office and _to hell with it._

She could hear her own breath rattling in her chest as she jogged through the park, her eyes burning in the cold. She just - she had to get to Castle.

Coonan had killed her mom. His name rose in her esophagus like bile and she swallowed it down, pressing the back of her hand to her mouth. Her thighs were quivering, her biceps ached. She'd have bruises on her throat and her chest from where Castle had forcibly stopped her.

But would she stop him?

Did she want to stop him? Torture wasn't justice, wasn't the _law_ and a courtroom with a judge and jury deciding Coonan's fate. But she'd often woken from nightmares in which she put a bullet between the killer's eyes and was done with it. Walked off into the sunset.

Castle was marching off to save her from that darkness, but she'd always thought herself a lost cause. If she was too late. . .

If she was too late, she might just stand there and let Coonan have it.

Either way, Kate Beckett was going to be there. This was her mother's killer. She deserved to have his fate in her hands for once. It was about damn time. She was going to look him in the face and have him _know_ - have him know what he'd done.

* * *

Agent Richard Castle entered the office complex's lobby, palming the lock pick, and slowly scanned the interior. He'd given himself a thirty second recon before he had initiated his plan, and he was gratified to find his hasty intelligence was correct.

He approached the bank of elevators and narrowed his eyes at the directory. Third floor office suite. A dermatologist at the other end. The late hour ensured that civilians would not be caught in the crossfire.

Castle stopped at the frosted glass door of Coonan's offices, pulled the lockpick back out. His black eye throbbed as he concentrated. The door was only minimally harder, and it opened up to a spacious, wood-paneled sitting area. And an alarm box that was beeping.

Shit.

He went to the panel and tugged a device out of his jacket pocket; illegal tech when he used it like this. The alarm panel was flashing, asking for a code before it would go off, but it was still silent as it warned him, _sixty seconds._

He popped the cover off the panel and snagged the white wire, shredded the rubber casing with his butterfly knife. The device fit right into the wiring, easy, and within moments Castle had deactivated the alarm.

He flipped the lock back on the door and checked for other exits, but this was the only one.

With the anteroom and individual offices cleared, Castle slung off his backpack and headed back for the area's supply rooms in the center. He found the fuse box and, like he'd hoped, the main lines for the alarm. He cut them as well, and then the lights for good measure. Just in case.

He wanted Coonan to know, tomorrow morning when he came in, that someone had been in here. That he was being hunted.

Castle checked his supplies, tugged on his shoulder holster once more, meticulously went over his weapons. Everything was set.

Coonan had come to his father a few years ago, Castle remembered, asking for help reaching out to the enlisted guys who'd disappeared into Black's organization. He wanted to start a charity rebuilding bombed out schools in Afghanistan.

Castle could start there. Employees on record, that kind of thing. He moved towards Coonan's private office and picked the lock on the file cabinet, tugged it open slowly.

Armed for Education apparently had a multi-faceted mission - rebuild schools, promote general health care, and provide jobs training to young adults and former native soldiers. Castle studied the glossies and saw the telltale earmarks of a clever photoshop artist. The photos in these pamphlets weren't even from the same area - some weren't even from Afghanistan.

All a fraud. Which meant Coonan was certainly using his charity as a cover for illegal activities, defrauding investors and those who donated to the cause. Castle was strangely grateful his father had refused to give out any kind of contact information for those former soldiers, but he wondered more which other agencies hadn't been so hard-nosed.

As he sifted through the file folders, he found names of guys he recognized. Bad-asses all, so Coonan definitely was looking for a type. And this one - yeah, he vaguely remembered hearing about some non-sanctioned action when they were being put through their paces in Afghanistan.

What were they doing if not rebuilding schools?

More than a decade ago, Coonan had been hired to murder Beckett's mother - of that, Castle was certain. No more Special Forces missions, but he'd started this charity, and now he was recruiting from former black ops boys, sending them back to Afghanistan, doing something over there.

From these records, it looked like Coonan had amassed an army.

Shit, not Coonan-

The puppet master himself. The one who had ordered Coonan to kill Johanna Beckett. He was the one, wasn't he?

The wizard behind the curtain was the one amassing a private army.

* * *

In the building's spacious lobby, right before the elevators, Beckett paused and slowly turned around.

The back of her neck was prickling, the hair standing up. She slowed her breath and listened, wondered if she was sensing Castle's passage just ahead of her or if it the NSA had followed behind.

She caught the sensation again, stepped instinctively towards the wall, putting her back to it.

With her hand on her weapon, she swept her eyes over the lobby, the dark interior and the shining elevator doors.

But there was nothing.

She pushed the call button but waited with her back to the elevator, still scanning the lobby. When the doors opened, she stepped backwards onto the lift.

Still, she'd seen nothing.

* * *

Beckett moved off the elevator on the third floor, turned towards the office suite which Coonan's charity rented, her feet soft on the tiles as she moved for the frosted glass of the front door. Her heart was pounding as she touched the knob, but it didn't move. Still, she could see scratches near the lock where someone had picked it.

She squinted through the glass, saw the shadowed ripple towards the back. She knew he was here.

She hit the door with a thud, groaning when it didn't budge, the door not giving an inch. Beckett pulled out the weapon she'd scrounged from his place, a Sig Sauer P228 with its staggered column magazines and ugly black finish. A work weapon. Kate let out a long breath, wrapped her sleeve around her hand, and smashed the butt of the gun into the glass.

It didn't shatter, but it did let forth a frightening sound and split along the knob. She took another whack at it and a triangle-shaped piece as long as her forearm broke out, shattered on the floor.

Shit, that was loud.

Beckett switched the gun to her left hand, reached through the jagged-edged hole to fumble at the lock. She got it flipped and pushed inside, her heart pounding, both hands steadying the weapon.

She took it slowly, in a loose Weaver stance, and made for the back office on soft feet.

A shadow formed at her right and she spun, finger flexing on the trigger, only to find Agent Richard Castle holding a gun on her.

"I nearly shot you," she hissed, flashing the barrel of gun upright and standing down.

"Beckett." His face was wiped clean of all emotion as he came near; he looked surprised. "You got out of those cuffs."

She shrugged, her weapon lowering to her side. "Took some doing."

"Wow." His eyes were intent on hers, something coming to life in them. She stepped closer, her body pulled to his, her eyes on his mouth, and then faintly registered, somewhere in the animal instinct part of her brain, that they were no longer alone.

Behind her.

Suddenly Castle was snatching her by the upper arm, whipping her around his body so that she stumbled and went to one knee, teeth jarring hard. She got back on her feet, furious and disoriented, but Castle grunted sharply, staggering, his hand reaching for his side.

Beckett saw the bright-dark stain of blood on his fingers, the whitewash of his face, before she saw the man behind him, just where she had been standing, his arm now sliding around Castle's neck with a bloodied knife in his hands.

Dick Coonan.

Beckett jerked her weapon up, nostrils flaring as she smelled the copper of Castle's blood, her eyes on Coonan. "NYPD, you fucking asshole, drop it."

Coonan chuckled, jerking Castle harder against his chest. "Not-uh, sweetheart. Imagine my surprise when I get the alarm, and happen to follow you inside - the very same NYPD detective I've been hearing about."

Hearing about?

"Coonan, drop your weapon or I will drop you," she said quietly. Castle looked bad; the knife at his throat was drawing blood, and he knees kept buckling, dragging Coonan with him.

"You should be arresting him. I'm an innocent citizen; I run this charity, former Special Forces-"

"And all around fucking hired contract killer. I know exactly who you are." She growled and cut her eyes back to Castle; his face was grey with blood loss, but she hoped, she _begged_, he was playing it up to throw Coonan off-balance.

"You know me, huh? Just like I know you." Coonan jerked on Castle's neck to bring his head into Beckett's line of sight again; she didn't have a shot, couldn't get a bead on him when Coonan kept ducking and Castle kept. . .crumpling.

"Let him go, Coonan. It's over for you."

He grinned, keeping his head behind Castle's. "Those big dark eyes look so sweetly familiar. I screwed up your life pretty good, didn't I?"

"You asshole," she spit out, growled past the choke in her throat, eyes locked on his. "You killed my mother. You left her for dead in an alley and-"

"It wasn't personal - Beckett."

He really did know her. And Castle - God, he looked bad. How did he _know _her-

"You've been causing the boss some trouble lately, Beckett. Funny I find you here. Maybe I should put the knife in you, take your body back to him-"

Suddenly Castle reared backwards into Coonan, smashing his skull into Coonan's face, the two men careening off each other. Beckett stepped forward with her gun raised, but Coonan bellowed and slashed at Castle with his knife. Kate fired twice, center of mass, and dropped Coonan to the floor, knife clattering.

Castle went down a breath later.

* * *

He groaned when she got to him, her hands shaking as she pressed her palm to the seeping knife wound at his back. Soaked through with blood. She hurriedly shucked her jacket and wadded it up under him; he rocked forward and struggled to sit up.

"Stop, stop, Castle, please. Stop moving."

She fumbled her fingers at his face, her other hand holding her jacket to his back, and he opened his eyes to her. "Kate."

Her heart flipped. "Where's your phone, Castle? I need your phone."

"Jacket," he gritted out, his hand suddenly gripping her hip. "In my pocket."

She ran her hands down his chest, rifling through his jacket; he grunted and kept trying to move, like he thought he could stand up.

"Where's - yours?"

"It's just the replacement-" She let out a noise as her fingers hit the cool glass of his phone, pulled it out quickly and entered his passcode. She could hear his grunt as she did, but the moment the apps popped up-

"Panic button." His slow realization came out in a chuckle that ended on a whine. It made a fist around her heart.

She'd pressed the panic button but where did that go? What help would it bring? She couldn't be sure; her fingers shakily dialed the 12th - the only number she could even remember, blood smearing on the face of his phone.

He rocked forward, was trying to get his hand under him. "Kate. Ka-"

"Stop moving, please stop moving," she groaned, pressing the phone to her ear with her shoulder so she could immobilize him. "I don't know how bad-"

"Detective Esposit-"

"Espo! Castle's been stabbed. We're in the financial district - 22 Cortland Street - I need a bus-"

"Got it. Sending units and a bus to you now-"

"It's bad - I need that bus yesterday."

"Kate." Castle's face was grey, eyes rolling back.

She dropped his phone to the floor, her arm coming around his chest to pull him closer, his skin cool to the touch. "I'm here. You're gonna be okay, Castle. You're going to be just fine."

"Not sure," he gritted out, his face a mask of pain. She pressed her lips to his forehead, her panic cresting.

"Stay with me, Castle. Just stay with me." Beckett shifted to get her legs under him, press her thigh into the jacket at his back, staunch the wound as best she could. He moaned and his lids fluttered. "Hey, come on. Castle. You gotta stay with me."

His eyes flashed open, a searchlight blue that burned straight through her. "How - how'd you get out of those cuffs?"

"I'm just that good," she murmured, brushing her lips across his temple to keep from having to look in his eyes. "Extra key."

The phone rang and she snatched it up - Esposito's number.

"Beckett, where-"

"Third floor on the left-" And already the elevator was shaking through the building, echoing the grinding of her heart. "There's an open door; we're straight through-"

"Got it. Paramedics are on their way."

She laid the phone down, hovered over Castle, brushing her fingers back through his hair only to realize his blood was all over the floor, streaming out of him, his face waxy and unresponsive.

"Castle. Castle, wake up. Stay awake."

But he wasn't opening his eyes.

A roar in her ears made her lift her head towards the open lobby; she saw men in black suits, a swarm of them spilling through the doorway - not the first responders, not Esposito's team.

The panic button. "Help. I need your help. He's been stabbed - we need a bus, a paramedic. Please-"

A hand was hauling her up, dragging her away from him.

"No! No, please. Wait-"

Silent, grim, the face that accompanied the hand never looked back, kept a brutal grip on her even as she fought to be released. Her arms were pinned, zip ties crunching her wrists together, Castle left alone on the floor, his blood an ever-widening pool around him.

"Castle! Wait. Please-"

They dragged her away.


	9. Chapter 9

**Close Encounters**

* * *

The black van loomed, brutal and bold in her vision; her ankle smacked the back bumper as the agent tossed her inside and shut the doors. She scrambled to get to her knees at the back window, saw the coterie of men carrying out a stretcher; she caught a flash of Castle's bloodless face before they disappeared around the corner.

And she sat there.

No one got in the driver's side; no one came.

She swayed on her knees and sank back, sucking in a long breath, and realized her thin shirt was soaked through with Castle's blood, her pants sticking to her and stiffening.

It was cold, sharply cold, and there was nothing but the corrugated metal of the floor and the sloped sides of the van.

Castle.

What had she done?

* * *

Again. Back here again.

She bit the inside of her cheek and glared into the nothing past her vision. Her hands were cuffed to the chair, the light was screaming in her face, darkness beyond. She had no idea how long she'd been here, but it had to be hours, her mind clicking over with every terrible scenario.

If he died and she was-

She took in another ragged breath, and gave up.

"Please just tell me if he's okay."

Breaking her silence broke the dam in her chest and the tears squeezed their way out, slicking her cheeks.

"Please. Please just tell me if he's okay."

The light seemed to throb with every pulse of her too-loud heart; she angled her head to avoid it, but there was no escape.

"He's my-"

She sucked in a ragged, grieving breath and searched for the words, the perfect explanation, anything to make someone understand.

"He's my partner. Please."

The lock disengaged and the door clicked.

* * *

She jerked forward when the man's hand touched her wrists, realized the skin was rubbed raw. But he lifted her from the chair effortlessly and marched her towards the hall in cuffs.

"Can you just tell me-"

"No talking," he said. She could see where his razor had nicked him, just at the working part of his jaw, the muscle there jumping. He was pissed off at having to escort her? Something.

She kept her mouth shut.

He led her down the hallway and onto an elevator; his hand was meaty, graceless as he turned her face to the wall. She stayed there, heard him entering his passcode for the elevator, felt the car begin to sink.

She closed her eyes and saw Castle's blanched face, opened them again to see her escort's still ticking jaw.

Beckett swallowed hard past the dryness in her mouth. She just wanted to know - had to know - if he was alive. If he was alive, she could face anything they did to her.

The elevator stopped and he propelled her backwards out of it, roughly twisted her around to get her moving.

But she recognized this nondescript hallway. She knew this floor by its smell alone.

Her heart surged in her chest, her cuffed hands still behind her and throwing off her stride, but she walked a little faster at her escort's side.

He came to a room and swiped his key fob across the grey panel to the right of the door. The lock clicked and he pushed it open, shoving her in ahead of him into the hospital room.

Castle was on the bed, propped on his side, and he was looking for her.

* * *

She looked brittle when she walked in the door. Castle shifted his hand slowly and held it out to her, but she stayed rooted to the spot, barely in the door.

"Kate-"

She opened her mouth but nothing came out, her lashes blinking slowly over suspiciously bright eyes.

And then he realized.

"Get those cuffs off her, damn it. I told you, Porter."

The agent shot him a look but did as he was told. When the cuffs came off, Beckett flew to the hospital bed.

He grunted at the impact of her arms around his neck, but curled his fingers in her jeans and kept her there. Kate was trembling, her mouth at his cheeks, his jaw, his eyelids.

"I'm so sorry; I am so sorry-"

"Okay, okay. Ease up there," he murmured, curling his hand at her hip and sliding his fingers under her stiff shirt. Porter finally left and he relaxed. "Beckett. You okay?"

She gave a little noise at that, her hands cupping his face. "Castle. You - are you-"

"Just some stitches. He missed the organs."

"Missed," she said flatly, her face going dark. "You pulled me out of the way and he got you instead."

He stroked his finger lightly up over her hip, didn't try to explain that.

She swayed on her feet, her eyes closing. "I thought. . ."

Castle was propped on one side to keep from tearing the stitches, but he felt the drag of medication pulling him out and couldn't compete. "Crawl in, Beckett."

She shivered, her eyes opening to a strange and difficult brown. "I - I-"

"Just let it go, Kate. I can't - don't have it in me for this right now."

Shit, he'd made her cry.

Castle stroked his palm at her back even though the movement was beginning to tug consciousness back to his pain. "Crawl in. That's an order, Detective."

She did, her knee coming up to the mattress and her body contorting to keep carefully away from him. But he wasn't having that. Castle settled his hand heavily on her shoulder, pulled on her to get her moving.

"Spoon, Beckett. Come on. Prop me up."

She huffed out a little breath at that, but turned her back to him, lifted her elbow to allow him to hang onto her, his arm hooked at her sternum. She stroked her fingers down his forearm, her head coming to rest on the pillow while he let his weight rest against her back.

"Castle."

He pressed his mouth to the nape of her neck, winced at the smell. "Should've let you shower but I. . . gonna fall asleep on you, Beckett."

"Sleep then. You should sleep." Her fingers were soothing down his arm, making patterns on the back of his hand.

He let his weight shift more fully onto her, sighing in relief as it eased the ache spreading across his back. "That's better."

She reached for him and slid her fingers through his hair, caressed his cheek.

He sighed into the blackness swirling closer. "Mm, Kate, I love you."

* * *

She let the tears slip into his pillow, didn't move an inch. His arm was at her chest, holding her together, and she kissed his knuckles, drew her fingers up and down the soft hair on his forearm.

His weight was heavy over her back, his breathing ragged and slow in her ear, and he was alive.

He was alive.

She should try to contact Esposito; she should do a lot of things. But she stayed where she was, let him use her as a body pillow, kept his wide and open palm close to her mouth where she could press her lips to his skin, hold on to him.

She had shot Coonan. Coonan was dead. Her answers were dead.

But he was alive.

He was alive.

It was hard to keep it firmly in her mind when she couldn't see his face; it kept slipping away, jolting her with panic at its absence until she remembered the weight pressing her down was his body, the heat searing her skin was his life covering hers.

Everything else was in transit, everything else was unknown and waiting in the dark for her. She had no answers, no resolution, a thousand threads that lead nowhere.

But he was alive.

And he still loved her.

It was the only resolution she needed.

He was her end.

* * *

Castle woke when the tech came in and changed his bandage, cleaned the wound. He grunted on a spike of pain, surprised by it, and felt Kate shifting awake beside him.

Well, she was practically beneath him at this point; he was using her like a teddy bear, curled up around her body and propped up so that his back was off the mattress.

The tech worked quickly, checked his temperature, and then left the room. He felt Kate stroking her fingers over and over his arm, lowered his head to kiss the side of her jaw.

"Hey," she said softly, turning her head to see him. Her eyes were so fragile, it killed him.

"I'm okay," he assured her, found her nose with his lips for a kiss. "I'm crushing you. Let me-"

"No!" She swallowed and shook her head against the pillow. "No. Just, let me turn around so I can see you."

"Not sure you can still breathe like that, Beckett," he said, trying to laugh.

She shook her head, but she was already moving slowly under him, turning so that he was draped at her chest now. He fought hard to keep the flickering pain off his face, was rewarded by the easing of her expression as she settled under him.

And then she lifted her head and pressed her mouth to his, her lips hot and soft, her tongue tentative. He ignored the pain in favor of stroking his fingers along her neck, the bruises he'd left on her skin, accepting her kiss with as much clarity as he could manage.

She touched his cheek and angled him away, breathing apologies as she brushed her mouth over his jaw, into his neck, holding him carefully.

He had to drop his head against the pillow, take in a long, slow breath through the burn that lanced up his back. She slid her hands over his shoulders, into his hair, cradling him, and he could almost pretend they were back in her apartment, in her bed, slowly recovering from another round.

"Castle, I thought. . .I thought I needed to be the one."

He hummed to let her know he heard, but he couldn't open his eyes. He didn't want to think about it, how she'd seduced him to get his keys and left him to sleep while she took it upon herself to chase after Coonan, to end it.

"But I was wrong - when it comes to this, I don't need to be the one. You almost died - you almost died, Castle, and I can't - I wouldn't survive that."

"You'd survive. You're stronger-"

"I don't want to survive that," she whispered, her mouth at his forehead, her lips burning. "I don't want to ever-"

"Kate. My job is - isn't going to be nice about-"

"It's not your job to indulge my obsession," she hoarsed out, her teeth at the bridge of his nose, her breath sharp as she curled around him. "It's not your job to get stabbed because of me."

"Just doing what had to be-"

"It's my fault," she interrupted. "Because I wouldn't just let it go and _wait_ for you, just wait. God, I'm - I feel sick."

"Don't throw up on me, Beckett."

Her laugh was strangled, but it came. He smiled into her neck and tasted her skin, tried to pull her further from this line of thought.

"I thought you'd never forgive me for handcuffing you," he whispered, couldn't help the grin that broke through.

She let out a breath and stroked her fingers down the side of his face. "Why? You handcuffed me just last week, Agent Castle."

He felt his whole body ease into her, relief draining through him. "Yeah, but I didn't do that last week," he murmured, nudging his nose into the stark bruises at her neck.

"Let's call the fight even," she said softly. "But I wish you'd handcuffed me and stayed, Castle."

"I thought you needed answers."

"I need you more," she gave out with a choke, and he felt the words as they dragged through her, the terrible and cold truth of it. "I just want you, Castle."

"Kate," he sighed, unable to even look her in the eyes, his body refusing to let him punish it any longer. But she still felt so broken under him, like she was barely holding her edges together.

Castle dragged his hand up her side until he could lay it over her heart, his fingers brushing her collarbone, his mouth at her jaw and as far as he could reach.

"Kate, next time. . ."

She stroked the shell of his ear, around and around, dizzying and hypnotizing.

"Next time without the knife."

He heard her soft exhaling laugh, and felt the way she hummed under him, settling in.

And then he let himself sleep.

* * *

Kate kept her breathing even through the worst of her tears, not even struggling against it, just made sure she didn't wake him. With a shaky hand, she persistently swiped her shirt against her cheeks, drying them as quickly as they came.

Her chest was raw with it, breaths short, but she kept an arm around him in the infirmary bed, couldn't stop stroking the soft edge of his ear, the skin right behind it, the short hair at his nape. Soothing him or herself, probably both.

His phone vibrated on the bedside stand, startling her enough to clutch at his shoulder, heart thumping, but Castle was too far under to react. Beckett uncurled her arm and reached for it almost unconsciously, her breath catching when she saw the blood on his phone from her fingers. From when she'd hit the panic button.

It was his father. The ID picture was the blank silhouette, the number unfamiliar, but she knew it was his father by the name attached: Black.

And probably a fake one at that.

But she answered it.

"This is Beckett."

"I might have known."

She closed her eyes and swallowed, her fingers curling at Castle's ear. "He's - asleep."

"Of course, you're the one behind it all. Did you get what you needed from my son?"

Beckett pressed her head back into the bed, hard, so grateful Black couldn't see her. "Castle was injured while we were apprehending-"

"He was stabbed because you're a liability to his discipline, training, and professionalism. He was stabbed because he's weak around you."

"He was stabbed because of me. Not because he's weak; he is not weak," she growled. "He was protecting me."

Black went on like he hadn't even heard her. "And on top of that, you're being the clever detective and stomping around Montauk, calling up family members just so you can reopen their wounds-"

Of course he knew about that. Of course.

"It's for him," she growled. "He has a right to know. You can't keep him from the truth."

"What truth? He has the truth. His mother left him. When I discovered the situation, I rectified it."

Rectified it. His father was an ass. "You can't threaten me. I-"

Castle stirred at her neck, and she sucked in a breath, kept still, her palm pressed at his neck in protection.

"This conversation is over," Black said crisply. "Just know that if I were there, you'd be back in handcuffs."

The call ended, and Kate slapped his phone onto the bedside stand, hard enough to make her palm sting, her frustration boiling over. She swiped at her cheeks, growling under her breath, pissed with herself, with his father for the truth he'd spoken-

But it was time to face the consequences. She'd done this. It was on her.

She had to call Esposito, and then probably her Captain as well, and explain.

* * *

Castle stabbed awake, heart racing. Kate was cradling him back down, hands at his face, his shoulders, lowering him to the bed. He blinked through the last half of crazy, sucked in a breath that ached, and tried to recall-

"Kate."

"You okay?" she said, standing at his bedside with the phone in one hand, her fingers stroking through the hair at his forehead.

"I had - I don't know. Dream, I think."

"I was just giving my statement to the NYPD. Eastman needs me to go with him and do the same for your guys, but I shouldn't leave you if you're-"

"No," he scraped out. "Fine. I'm fine. Go with him. I'll just. . .be resting."

Already his lids were heavy, his face slack as he tried to make his mouth form words.

"Castle. I'll be right back."

"Naw, it'll take hours," he sighed, realized his eyes were closed, her hand was stroking the side of his face. "Hours and hours."

"Then I'll make him debrief me in here."

"No, no," he muttered, struggling to push his eyes open. "I'm the only one gets to debrief you."

She laughed over his lips, leaning in to kiss him, her lashes like snowflakes.

"Not funny - true. 'S true."

"It is true. I like it when you debrief me, Castle. Get some sleep so we can debrief later, super spy."

He hummed, something else poking at him, an oddity in the back of his mind, trying to make itself known. He opened his eyes again and stared at her beautiful face, the half-smile cracking her mouth, and then realized.

"You crying?"

She sighed and her thumb stroked the skin at the corner of his eye. Her fingers were so cool and soft.

"Go to sleep."

* * *

"Why can't I take him back to the hotel?" she asked again. "I understand that my place and his are both probably off-limits but at least there-"

"No," Eastman said. "We can't guarantee your security."

"Castle doesn't want to stay. He wants to go home. Surely-"

"No." Eastman pushed open the door to the interrogation room - at least it wasn't that spotlight and the single chair, at least there was that. "I'll let you know when we're sure the area can be secured."

"But you have my statement. You even woke Castle up for his. Can't you-"

"Detective. Either you follow my rules or you leave my location. Alone."

She pressed her lips together, nostrils flared as she breathed. "Fine."

"I'll take you back to his room," Eastman said curtly. She followed at his side because she had no other choice; they were evidently on orders from Black to treat her like an enemy. One they'd called a truce with, but an enemy nonetheless.

When she pushed open Castle's door and stepped inside, she flinched at the sound of the lock turning, sighed as she came to his bedside. He woke the moment she snagged his fingers.

"Hey," he murmured. "They gonna let me out?"

"No. They said they can't guarantee our safety."

"That's bullshit," he muttered, easing up a little more in the bed. She watched carefully, waiting for him to hit the threshold for his pain, but he actually seemed better.

She sighed at him. "You know it, and I know it. But they won't let us leave. I think - well, I talked with your father, Castle. I think he's behind this."

"I know he is," Castle said dryly. "I'm being punished."

"You?" she breathed out. "But I'm the one who shot Coonan-"

"I'm the one working a case on US soil," he said, shrugging at her. "I'm the one who got stabbed, _causing_ you to shoot him. Beckett, he's. . .I promise you, I will find another way. I'll get your answers-"

"No, stop," she mumbled, pressed her hand to her forehead, felt the shame climb her cheeks. "I don't want to - we'll leave that for another day." Her mother and his as well. Time enough for digging in the past later. Much later.

"I was sloppy," he said, his eyes intent on hers. "I heard you coming, saw you standing there, and instead of keeping alert, I _flirted_ with you."

Kate's mouth dropped open, her hand drawing down to cover her surprise. "What? That wasn't - you weren't - you were flirting with me?"

He growled. "You know I was."

"Castle, you asked me how I got out of the cuffs - oh." Kate laughed, a rush of warmth melting the ice in her chest. "Oh, that's not funny, but-"

"It is a little," he sighed. She reached out and stroked the hair from his face, realized she couldn't stop touching him. Everywhere. All the time. Eastman had looked so uncomfortable with her in the room while Castle gave his statement, but now she realized it was because of this, the way they were.

"Castle, you are - an amazing man," she whispered. "And I don't deserve you."

"Sure you do. I have a father who likes to make my life miserable, I work for the CIA and will - as a rule - keep secrets from you, and due to my mother's abandonment, I'm emotionally unavailable while concurrently being needy and-"

She laughed and pressed her mouth into his, silencing him before he could go on any further. He was smiling against her kiss, and he even got a hand up to stroke the hair back from her face, fingers calloused but so gentle.

"I think I'll take you," she said, nudging her nose into his. "I'll definitely take you."

"Man," he sighed, his eyes so dark on hers. "Our kids are gonna be so cute. And maybe a little klutzy, Beckett."

And she didn't even mind. Because somewhere or somehow, she thought maybe they really would be.


	10. Chapter 10

**Close Encounters 2**

* * *

"He needs a permanent place to recover."

Castle heard it from far off, the layers of cotton and gym socks that swaddled his head keeping him from understanding clearly. It was Beckett speaking, and she was in the room with him, but he couldn't get his eyes to open.

"No. That's not acceptable."

It wasn't acceptable at all. How had they sneaked more pain meds to him? He could barely keep himself cognizant. This was terrible.

"I'm taking him home with me. You better get it cleared because we're not staying here another day."

Another _day_? How long - damn it, if Eastman told that stupid med tech to give him painkillers-

"Then do that. Go do that. I will wheel him out myself if you don't help us."

Ah, good. She was good. She'd get him out of here.

No more pain meds. Too fuzzy, too hard to hold on to his days.

* * *

Beckett managed to con an SUV from the CIA motor pool in the underground garage, and even though they were the middle car wedged into a security convoy, even though Castle was medicated in the back, the seat laid down so he didn't have to sit up, her heart was easy in her chest as she drove.

The black Charger in front of her kept a sedate pace, and her foot surged against the gas pedal, wanting speed, but she followed. She followed because Castle was in the back, doped for the ride.

The March day had broken out with whiteheaded clouds, the blue face of the sky pocked with the swirl of changing weather. Warmth permeated the car as the sun burned through the windshield; Beckett cracked the window and breathed in the spring.

She slung her hand at the bottom of the steering wheel and shifted in her seat, the wind picking up her hair and scattering it across her face. She scraped a strand out of her mouth and pushed it behind her ear, hooking it over the end piece of her sunglasses.

Castle's head was up near the driver's side and she could just reach him if she tried. They'd piled blankets on one side to keep him from rolling back, and she had to turn her head and check, just to be sure. His face was pale in the brilliant blue sunlight but at rest; unlined, smooth, strong. She put her eyes back on the road and curled her fingers in the hood of her sweatshirt.

She'd hooked up her iphone to the stereo and a soft melody hummed through the interior, the words snatched away by the wind. She thought there was something about _you were right all along, take me home._

The handheld radio crackled and she shot a glance to the rearview mirror, but it hadn't woken Castle. She picked it up and checked the settings, but it was still on the correct channel. She licked her bottom lip as the mile marker came up on the right, had a moment's apprehension when the lead car didn't slow, but the Charger pulled off at the exit, just as she'd instructed.

Castle made a noise, mumbled some words or a string of the song playing, and she reached back to stroke her hand through his hair. Her thumb skimmed the ridge of his eyebrow and the feel of his skin, warm and soft, filled her with the sense of him.

Separate, inviolate. Richard Castle.

And she was so in love with him.

* * *

"Dad. This is the man. It's all because of him."

Her voice dragged him upwards into the light, everything in his vision backlit by the sun, including the sharp profile of her smile.

"Hey there. You with us?"

Her cool fingers shaded his eyes, feathered at his cheekbone before the sun was eclipsed by the hard edges of a doorway. He was being carried in on the pallet she'd made for him in the back of the SUV. The security team was carrying him through the door of her father's cabin like an invalid.

"Oh. Sir," he startled, trying to get up and stand before the older man following Kate into the living room.

Kate snagged his fingers, shook her head as she laid his hand back down at his side. His team lowered him to a couch, made sure he wouldn't roll, and then quickly disappeared. His drugged self was left with Kate kneeling tender and gorgeous in front of him, and then her greyed father blending into the rough wood of the cabin.

He struggled to sit, even as Kate let out a noise of protest, but he waved her off and got his feet on the floor, pushed past the pulsing ache. Manageable, and he'd been cooped up in the CIA's infirmary for a week now.

"Mr. Beckett," he said, felt the gravel in his voice shifting.

He moved to stand, but Jim came forward and put a hand on his shoulder, eased him down.

"Don't get up on my account, Richard."

Castle nodded, kept carefully away from the back of the couch, surprised when Beckett came to sit beside him, her knee brushing his. Her father sat in the easy chair opposite them, a grim look on his face.

So Castle started. "I apologize, sir. She's right - this was my fault. I opened this thing up again-"

"Your fault?" Jim asked, his quiet nature quelling whatever was in his eyes.

"Castle, no," Kate murmured, and her fingers came to play at his knee. "I wasn't assigning blame. I wanted my father to know that it's only because of you that we have any answers at all."

But he watched Jim. Castle wasn't a father himself, but he knew in his heart that a promise like Beckett had made - a promise not to self-destruct - required accountability. Not just from Beckett herself, but from him as well.

"I'm sorry, sir," he said quietly. Jim Beckett held his gaze long enough for it to matter and then he nodded.

"No," Kate insisted. "No. Castle, you are not at fault. What you did was exactly what I wanted."

"What we want and what is right are not the same." He saw Jim accept that and with a lift of his finger, dismiss it as well.

"Son, I appreciate what you've done," her father said, nodding slowly, his eyes moving back to Kate. "And I appreciate you putting that look on her face."

Castle shifted his gaze to her and was stunned by the sun-drenched beauty of her, the tumbling riot of hair she'd let air dry in the car, the comfortable line of her sweatshirt cradling her neck, and those eyes.

She was smiling at him with only her eyes, deep and wonderful and at peace.

At peace for now.

* * *

Kate grinned but shook her head at him, her feet dangling in the lake as she sat by Castle's side on the dock. "No. You're not going in. You'd get those stitches infected."

"But this is boring," he muttered, wrinkling his reddened nose at her.

She'd caught herself just in time, kept her mouth shut about the sunblock before he could give her that thunderous look _stop babying me, Beckett; I'm a CIA operative_, but now maybe she shouldn't have.

"Beck-ett," he sing-songed, rolling his shoulders as he carefully lifted first one foot and then the other in an approximation of his physical therapy exercises. "I. Am. Bored."

"I know something that will entertain you," she murmured.

"You gonna strip for me?" His eyebrows lifted suggestively, but he kept up the leg extensions. He wasn't a slacker when it came to the PT; in fact, she had to often keep him from pushing himself too hard, too far. When the stitches began to bleed, she nixed his rigid training schedule.

Instead of answering his leer, she slowly stood up, trailing her fingers up his arm to his shoulder, skirting his neck, his ear, lightly touching the top of his head. He followed her up with his gaze, the tease falling away as the arousal burned clear.

Her father had gone river fly-fishing at five this morning and wouldn't be back until sundown; they had the lake to themselves, and the dock was sun-warmed.

And his eyes were hot.

She slipped the buttons free of her shirt, slowly, making her way down, exposing the cream of her skin to his view. His hand came out and circled around her ankle, like he expected her to float away into the blue sky, but she didn't stop.

Shrugging painstakingly out of one sleeve of her white beach shirt, she let that side fall open, exposing the waning moon of her shoulder. She turned her head towards it, brushed her lips over her own skin and let her eyes sift shut.

Her fingers pianoed over the exposed length of her thigh, caught up in the soft material of her shirt, and she felt Castle's hand skim up her calf.

Kate lifted her fingers to her collar, eased the shirt aside to expose the long measure of her neck and the line of her clavicles, thrilled to the slide of his hand to her knee in harmony.

The shirt dropped in a sudden breath of air, exposing the rippling flesh of her stomach to the spring sunlight and the shadows of budded trees. Her eyes opened when his mouth came to her knee, moist and warm, his breath touching off points of fire. He nipped at her, brushed his thumb over the side of her thigh, fingers stroking the soft crease of skin.

Kate slid her hand into his hair, pushing it off his face so she could see his eyes, the sweep of his lashes. She eased her fingers into the waistband of her skirt, drew her hand back from his face so she could shimmy out of it.

Now his palms were hot at her skin, his head coming forward to press into her thighs, the sharp scrape of his unshaven cheeks making her body come awake. She cradled the nape of his neck with one hand, combed the back of her fingers through his hair as his mouth opened against the seam of her legs.

She shivered and stepped away, releasing him, his hands falling to his sides as he leaned heavily against the piling. His eyes roamed her body like he'd never seen her before.

Kate turned around, her feet at the edge of the wooden dock, her eyes on the blue and brown horizon.

And then she made a shallow dive into the lake.

* * *

When she surfaced, she gasped a breath of laughing air and gave him the most amazing smile he'd ever seen. He was stuck on the dock nearly inchoate by her strip tease - could he even call it that? it had been both as joltingly erotic and beautifully innocent as any work of art.

She stroked closer, her head dipping below the line of the water, her eyes open, and then coming up again, directly in front of his knees.

He reached out, ignoring the wince in his back, and ran his fingers over her sleek, seal hair.

"Hey, beautiful."

"Hey yourself," she said, her tone rippling and light. "You want to work?"

He lifted an eyebrow in question and she came closer, treading water so that the dark purple straps of her bra lowered and raised like she was sounding the lake.

"Like this," she smiled, and wrapped her arms around his calves, laying her cheek to his shin. Her eyes were green like the water. "Now lift."

He wouldn't be able to do many, but he gave it a shot, extending both legs only to feel her swim up with him, buoying herself just enough to give him only a slight added resistance. He grinned back and lowered his legs, loved the feel of her breasts pressed against him, the heat of her mouth open at his shin.

"What a strong super spy you are," she demured, scraping her teeth up his skin and making his breath catch. She laughed and lifted her head, her eyes fathomless.

"And you, Kate Beckett, are the best medicine."

"What a sap," she chuckled, but the tenderness on her face said something else entirely.

* * *

She made the men scrambled eggs and toast for dinner, didn't try for anything fancy or energetic. Her father, most likely, would come back to the kitchen for a midnight snack anyway, his habits just like Kate's, but Castle needed to get horizontal as soon as she could possibly convince him to lie down.

Jim carried their plates to the kitchen table, the light oak gleaming in the overhead lamp, and Kate followed with the orange juice. When they were settled, she saw Castle reach for it in the middle of the table, only to curl his fingers back into his palm and desist. Kate was just about to jump up and pour his juice herself when her father kicked her shin and took the pitcher, began pouring everyone's glass.

She smiled at him in gratitude and they began to eat, silence reigning comfortably, its dominion like a blanket.

She felt bad for pushing Castle on the dock, riding his legs like she was five years old again, but he'd looked so proud of himself, and his skin was warmer than the lake, and she loved his strength in a way that had to be mentally twisted.

He looked better after only a few days here. The sunlight had brought out some gold to his hair that made his eyes as blue as the sky, his crow's feet crinkling with white lines as his skin got some color. She kept her lashes lowered so she could observe him, the easy tilt of his head and the unpained line of his brow.

Her father slipped his hand over hers on the table, an anchor. She lifted her eyes to him and he gave her that crookedly approving smile.

* * *

"You're kinda wicked, you know that?"

Beckett laughed as she straddled him and settled back on his knees, her fingers stroking up and down his thighs as he gritted his teeth against her. "I am? Why's that?"

"Teasing me like this. So not fair."

She shrugged but decided he'd had enough, slid off his lap to settle beside him on the bed. He was lying down exhausted after the physical therapy session, she knew that, but she'd been trying to distract him from the pain.

"You know, I wouldn't have to tease you so ruthlessly if you just took your pain meds, Castle."

"How does _that_ relate?"

"You were feeling no pain when I-"

He growled and hooked his arm around her neck, dragged her down against his chest. She came, laughing, glad she'd picked his uninjured side. She pulled her knee up over his thighs, settled down with him.

"Just so you know, if I have to use my feminine wiles to ease your pain, Castle, I will."

He was still grunting a laugh, his hand rhythmically squeezing her bicep. She knew it hurt him to laugh, hurt him to move side to side after one of his sessions, but he never mentioned it, never let it slip. He was so damn stoic - so much of himself was locked behind the wall of his professionalism, his training.

Before all this, she'd started to break through to him; she'd been inside. She wished she could get back there again.

"Maybe," he started, then stopped to breathe. She lifted her head to look at him, saw the tension rippling on his face.

"Maybe you need a pill?" she snorted.

"Yeah."

"Uh-huh." But she reached past him for the bottle on the bedside table, popped it open to shake one out in her hand. He'd pressed his head back against the headboard, his throat working as he got himself together. "Here, Rick."

His head jerked up and he stared at her. "Rick?"

She shrugged. "Felt right. I won't if you - I mean, your father calls you Richard. Ew."

He huffed a laugh and took the pill from her, tossed it back without water. She watched him for a moment, then took his hand, twined her fingers through his.

"You mind if I call you Rick?"

"No, it's good. Never - never had a nickname like that before."

She sighed and curled in closer to him, eased her mouth to his jaw. She could already feel his body releasing, softening. "Never had a nickname?"

"Well, not one I could repeat in polite company."

She laughed and scraped her teeth at his scruff. "Might need to hear that one."

"When your father's not anywhere close by."

Kate settled in a little closer, warmed by his heat, liking the way his arm drew around her shoulders so heavily, the slow slide of his eyelids as he fought somnolence.

Best time to start. "Castle, if I find your mother-"

"No." The word barked out of him like a command, his body coming to attention.

She sighed, pressing into his side, trying to gentle him. "If I found her. Would you want to meet her?"

"No. You don't even know that it's her."

"I do, Castle," she murmured, then lifted her head from his chest to give him the truth. "I found your birth certificate in public records."

He glowered back.

"You must've seen your birth certificate, Castle." She stroked the hair from his forehead, knew she was walking on thin ice, but she couldn't keep things from him. Not him, not now. "I know you have. Her name is on it. You told me yourself that you changed your name to Castle because you didn't want hers. So I know you know it."

"I never said I didn't know her name." He was grinding his teeth as he spoke, his eyes averted.

"But you wouldn't tell it to me. I had to find it on my own."

"Only thing I haven't told you," he muttered.

She froze, but ignored that comment to direct him back to the conversation. "But Martha Rodgers _is_ your mother. And I've talked to some of her family - your family, Castle - and-"

"Not my family. You're my family."

Her mouth opened but nothing came out. She couldn't very well deny it.

It was true.

She slid her hand up to his cheek, curled her fingers at his jaw, stroked his earlobe. "Okay, Castle. Okay."

"I liked it when you called me Rick."

She studied his drugged eyes, memorizing that look on his face, and lifted up to kiss his warm mouth.

"Rick."

His answering hum, tired but happy - she'd made him happy again - had her smiling so wide it might break her.

"You're my family too."

* * *

He'd just eased onto the couch when Jim Beckett finally spoke.

"So, Mr. Castle, Katie told me you're a-"

She _did?_

"-police officer?"

Oh. She. . .well, that explained his being stabbed by Coonan. And investigating her mother's case. He shifted his eyes back to Kate for an instant, then regarded her father.

The CIA security team had left them here in moderate privacy. They had posted men at the roads and a couple of roving pairs in the woods, but for the most part, he and the Becketts were blessedly untouched by it. Eastman called to check in of course, because Eastman was his partner - if the CIA had partners.

"Actually, sir," he began. "I work for the Central Intelligence Agency as a covert operative."

Jim Beckett's mouth dropped. Kate sank into a chair, staring at him.

"Kate signed a document that prevents her from sharing that information, and I appreciate her loyalty, but you should probably know what your daughter's in for."

"Well, damn."

Castle's lips quirked. "You could say that. The work often seems capricious, but I want to assure you that I'm not. Not entirely - well, as much as I can avoid it."

"Well, Katie, he uses some five dollar words, sweetheart." Jim's wink and his drawl were exaggerated, but his face softened as he looked between the two of them. "No wonder you're in love with him."

Her father could see it?

"I want to marry her," he blurted out, felt his cheeks burn as both Becketts snapped back to him.

"Castle," she gasped.

"Just putting it out there," he sighed. "Come on, Kate. It can't be that much of a surprise."

She stared at him and he saw the flicker of uncomfortable movement from her father. Castle turned his head to the man and shrugged with one shoulder.

"If she'll have me, of course."

"Castle. Please."

"It wasn't a question, Beckett." He felt his smile, lopsided and half-hearted, fall from his face. "Not yet anyway."

"I wouldn't answer you now even if it was," she said heatedly, lifting to her feet to stride towards him. "That's a terrible way to ask."

He huffed a laugh, shook his head slightly even though the movement made him hurt. "Just wanted your father to know. In case there are objections."

"It's not for me to say," Jim spoke up. "Think Katie's got her mind made up."

"You do?"

Kate rolled her eyes and sank down on the couch next to him, a little too forcefully, and it twinged in his side.

"Castle," she sighed. "Really. Only you." She said it with exasperation, and he knew he was supposed to hear it like _Only you would be so ridiculous_ but he heard what she felt anyway: _Only you._

That was answer enough.

* * *

When her father finally went to bed, Kate slipped off the couch and padded quietly down the hall towards the guest room. She touched her fingers lightly to the knob and hesitated, let the feeling of anticipation and expectancy fill her chest and overrun her throat until she couldn't anymore.

She pushed the door open and found him already asleep.

Oh.

She sighed and lingered on the threshold, the room still painted with the lamp's orange glow, as if he'd fallen asleep waiting for her. Probably had.

Kate didn't want to wake him.

She slipped inside the room, softly shutting the door and leaning back against it. Castle was in plaid pajama pants borrowed from her father and a long-sleeved black tshirt. A week at the cabin hadn't yet kicked his black-clothes habit, and it was a little heart-rending, the way he held on to what small routines he had.

She came forward slowly, her eyes on the outline of his body under the covers, the flare of his shoulders to the narrowing of his hips, the long and hard demarcation of his thighs. She didn't mean to do it, but she found herself crawling into the bed with him, tucking her body into the hollow space at his back.

When her forehead met his spine, he jerked awake.

"Kate?" Her name was quiet on his tongue, but she heard the alertness and sighed, uncurled her fingers to stroke his back. "What are you - come around so I can see you."

The gruffness in his voice thinly masked a need she would never deny, so she shifted up and slid her thigh over his knees, came around to his front so he could look in her eyes.

"Hey," he said, his arm hooking around her waist and a smile on his lips. "That was sexy."

She laughed a little at that, rewarding his effort, and slipped into the cove his arm made.

"You can get closer," he murmured. "I didn't take a painkiller but I'm fine like this."

She shrugged her shoulders and scooted in only a little more, brought her hand up between them to stroke her fingers across the soft material of his shirt.

"You didn't take a pill?" she asked. "But you did before dinner, right?"

"No," he said, didn't seem to understand why she was asking. "I hate the pills. I told you I wouldn't-"

"So what you said. Can't blame it on being drugged then." She lifted her eyes to him with a hesitant smile, not sure if she wanted the excuse or not.

He sighed and his hand trapped hers, but he said nothing, staring down into her with something like disappointment.

She didn't know what to say, didn't know how to admit to the want when it seemed so out of her reach.

He finally spoke, his thumb burrowing into the meat of her hand. "Do you want to blame it on being drugged, Kate? If you need that, then-"

"No."

The tiredness lifted from his eyes like a veil.

"No, I don't need that. Or want it," she said quietly. "You have to know by now that I love you."

"I know," he smiled, slow and strong and spilling out light. His fingers seemed to tighten around her hand, encased and encompassed, warm and anchored.

"I just - don't know how to do this. And anyone marrying me seems farfetched. But if it were to happen-"

"It will happen."

She huffed and slid her eyes away, but she felt the silliness bubbling up. "I just mean. It would be with you."

"Will be. With me. You and me, Kate Beckett."

She closed her eyes on that promise, felt the brush of his lips at her forehead. "You do know we're a long way from that. You know we're - this is just the start, Castle. I'm trying to keep this realistic."

"We're not exactly conventional," he murmured. "Look at us. So why should we restrict ourselves to conventions? I love you and I want to marry you and see our kids be born and I won't _not_ say that, not with the life I lead."

"Isn't that the very reason we shouldn't be. . .putting pressure on this?" she asked, her heart pounding, her palms prickling with heat.

"No pressure, Kate. We take it day by day, as it comes. We'll have to - I'm a spy," he laughed, his eyebrow raising. "And you're lucky you even know that information, sweetheart. Makes this easier."

"If we'd met - just on the street. You wouldn't have told me?"

"No. Couldn't have told you."

"No," she denied. "You'd have told me. You tell me things-"

"Like my passwords and access codes?" he murmured.

She sucked in a breath. "You're angry with me."

He sighed, but his hand curled tighter around hers. "I'm working on it."

She swallowed and shifted closer, pressed their joined hands to the plane of his chest, fitting herself against him. "I should've waited for you. Trusted you to-"

"You should have."

"I wasn't going to kill him," she said finally. Because apparently that needed clearing up. "You should've let me go with you. We should've done it together."

"We should have."

They lay together in silence, her eyes closed and her nose at his collarbone, letting that sift out between them. After a long time, his hand came to her neck and his mouth down to her ear.

"You didn't ask, but I forgive you, Kate."

She hadn't asked because she didn't deserve it. But she'd needed it all the same.

Kate nudged his jaw aside and pressed her mouth to his, the slide of tongues like absolution, the heat of his body informing hers, guiding hers.

His hand slipped up the back of her shirt, pressed his palm to her bare skin to draw her closer. She came but kept her arms between them, cradling his face with her fingers, being careful of him.

She was going to be careful with him.

* * *

the end of **Close Encounters 2: The Man With The Golden. . .**

Stayed Tuned for **Close Encounters 3: Die Another Day**

* * *

"Beckett, I think you should stop."

She stalked away from him, shoving both hands through her hair before pivoting on her heel to face him. She had to swallow down the instinctive urge to lash out, to _hurt_ him for that, and instead she modulated her tone, kept herself in check.

"We are so close, Castle." She dropped her hands and lifted her eyes to his.

Her CIA spy looked for all the world like standing in her apartment was his own little kingdom. He had a hip cocked against her kitchen counter, an insufferable twist on his lips, and when she actually looked around-

Shit, he'd practically moved in.

No wonder he thought he could order her around, flash his smile and have her on her knees for him. She was so tired of running into the wall of his damn CIA secrecy. He had a lead but he couldn't tell her; he knew a guy, but he couldn't have her come with him. He gave her bits and pieces and expected her to be grateful.

"I have a lead. I have a good lead on this case, Castle. I'm not stopping now."

"Beckett, we can't run at this head on. This guy has the NSA in his back pocket; it calls for a subtlety you and the boys lack."

His smirk had her hands clenching. "You've been listening to your asshole of a father again, haven't you?"

He jerked back at that, ice sheeting his eyes and removing him from her.

But Black was a bastard, and Castle needed to stop calling the man whenever their investigation moved forward. She hated having Black's fingerprints all over this, with his sneering disdain for the NYPD and his not-at-all subtle comments about her capabilities.

"Let's leave my father out of this," he said finally, his eyes like polar ice caps. "I'm not changing my mind, Beckett. We're not starting a war until I'm certain we can finish."

"If it's a war, then it's a war. We're not sitting on this while-"

"Your life is in danger, Beckett. My life is in danger. These are serious threats."

"Because were are _so close_. We have him running scared, and now is the time to-"

"Now is the time to lie low," he hissed, reaching out and snagging her by the wrist. "Lie low and live to fight another day."

She shrugged him off and paced away. "You don't understand. I need-"

"The fuck I don't," he snorted. She spun back to him, eyes narrowed, but he looked just as pissed as she felt.

"Then help me. Help me, or I will do this alone, Castle."

"No, you won't. The Agency has jurisdiction-"

She snorted, crossed her arms over her chest. "When the hell have you ever cared about the Agency's jurisdiction? This is my mother's case, not your damn playground."

He jerked to attention. "_Play_ground-"

"Showing up at the 12th, commandeering my team, seducing me so you can have your way, doling out pieces of information when you think I can _handle_ it. I'm sick of you bullying me, Castle."

"Bullying you? What the hell-"

"I'm so tired of you holding it over my head. I _know_ I fucked up. I was the one you bled all over, remember? But you don't get to-"

"I do get to," he snarled, stalking forward. "I get to say, Detective Beckett, because it is _my case_. And you need to stop."

"It's my mother. And I won't stop," she said, her voice raw in her throat. "You know I won't."

"As the lead on this case, I'm telling you-"

"Fuck off," she snarled.

The cold in his eyes swirled up as he came closer. When he touched her, it wasn't the crushing, icy grip she was expecting, but the press of his warm palm to her neck, thumb stroking her jaw. He was turning the heat up, but it didn't melt the deadly, closed-off certainty in his eyes.

He leaned in, his breath skirting her cheek, nose nuzzling hers. "As the man sleeping in your bed, Kate Beckett, I am asking you to stop."

She closed her eyes, tried to force breath past that.

Still. He was still seducing her for his own ends, bringing out the charm to beguile her away from what she knew to be true.

"I won't stop." She sucked in a breath and opened her eyes. "And you need to leave."


End file.
